


boyish

by ebenroot



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Love Letters, M/M, Unrequited Crush, to all the boys i've loved before au basically
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-02-13
Packaged: 2019-10-14 01:47:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 20,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17499287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ebenroot/pseuds/ebenroot
Summary: Sometimes, Yuuri mini-vomits his feelings.Sometimes, he does this a lot.Only, instead of talking through his feelings like a sane person would, he just…writes.--to all the boys i've loved before au





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> not beta'd

“You _broke up?!_ ”

Phichit has the audacity to look confused at Yuuri’s outburst, cheeks stuffed with a mouthful of freshly popped kettle corn.

He swallows it down before he quirks a well lined eyebrow and goes, “Well, yeah? I mean, Chris is thinking about NYU and _Yale_ , and I’m…not. It just seems kind of unfair to put that kind of pressure of maintaining a long-distance relationship when we’re both trying to work out our shit after high school, you know? So instead of dragging the inevitable out through senior year, we just…broke up.”

Phichit further punctuates this with another mouthful of kettle corn.

Yuuri has his quilt pulled tightly around his shoulders. It’s chilly in the home theater where he and Phichit conduct their usual Friday Night Movie, per the usual chill of autumn nights. The lack of one Christophe Giacometti snuggled up to Phichit’s side was a major distraction from the B-list horror movie Phichit managed to dig up in the deep, dark recesses of Hulu. Yuuri’s not sure if he’ll even be able to focus on the movie now with this news on his mind.

“…You were just together for a long time,” he murmurs after a beat.

Phichit shrugs.

“Yeah, we were…and we’re still going to be together! Just, you know, not in that way. And also, not like _together_ -together because he’s probably ditching this town the _second_ he gets his diploma. So, we’ll be together in friendly spirit. Together in each other’s hearts.”

“That sounded so corny.”

Phichit retaliates by flicking a stray kernel at Yuuri’s head.

 

* * *

 

 

The thing is, Yuuri thinks he’s a decent friend to Phichit. Not saying that he’s the _greatest_ or anything; Yuuri’s sure that Phichit knows some people that are more livelier than Yuuri, more fun to hang around with than Yuuri, filling some sort of aspect of friendship that Yuuri can’t ever satisfy because he’s _him_ , and Phichit is _Phichit._

But, for what it’s worth, Yuuri greatly treasures the friendship that he shares with Phichit, dating back to when they exchanged animal crackers in third grade to now where they spend their evenings bullshitting on Yuuri’s sofa as almost-kinda-sorta young adults. So when Phichit once swooned to Yuuri in their freshman year of high school how _charming_ and _handsome_ and _sweet_ Christophe Giacometti from European History is, Yuuri held his tongue from voicing the exact same sentiment.

It was fine though. Yuuri cherished his and Phichit’s friendship too much to make things complicated by them liking the same guy. Plus, Yuuri dressed in bland sweaters that were two sizes too big, rolled up his baggy jeans to make mismatched lengthened cuffs, and had tape around the nose of his glasses since sixth grade. He would have looked _awful_ on the arm of someone like Christophe. Phichit was obviously the better looking, more fun and more ‘boyfriend material’ worthy between the two of them, so it was _totally fine_.

He had swallowed his stupid feelings with a swig of his water and changed the topic to their English quiz. The situation was dealt with. Done. Over.

Or so he thought it was.

 

* * *

 

 

The first day of senior year hits like a bitch. Yuuri wakes up late, showers late, barely manages to grab the energy bar Mari chucks at him as he stumbles out the front door for his bike that always rests abandoned on the porch instead of properly stored in the garage. One day, Yuuri’ll get his license and stop being terrified of T-intersections and lane changing. One day, but not today.

He doesn’t share many classes with Phichit, unfortunately. Just US Government and Physics, which are later in the day. But he _does_ share his first period class — AP English — with Christophe, which is maybe…even _more_ unfortunate.

“Ugh, thank god there’s someone I like in this class,” Christophe bemoans as he takes the desk on Yuuri’s right, already beginning to pull out his notebook and put away the bottle of iced tea he was previously carrying. “I talked with three of my other friends and we have the same teachers but at _different_ periods. And I only have Pre-Calculus with Phichit, which sucks because now I can’t ask you the answers for our homework sheets—”

“You’re…talking to Phichit?” Yuuri asks mid chew of his energy bar.

Christophe raises an eyebrow. It’s unfair how in the years of knowing Christophe, the befuddled expression has only grown more handsome. _Everything_ about Christophe has gotten more handsome. He’s grown taller, his shoulders are broader, his voice is deeper and _ugh_ , he’s even growing facial hair. _Facial hair!_

Yuuri doesn’t even _like_ facial hair on guys but Christophe just somehow does it _perfectly_ and just, _ugh!_

“Of course I’m talking to Phichit. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Well…I mean…” Yuuri lowers his voice. as if he wasn’t already speaking in a whisper while the rest of their classmates yell and talk loudly amongst themselves as they catch up on what happened over the summer break. “…You guys broke up, right?”

Christophe bites the inside of his cheek.

“Yeah, we broke up. But we’re going to still _talk_ to each other.”

“It’s not…weird or anything?”

“No. I mean, I guess a _little_. But I’ll get over it. It’s not that big of a deal or anything.”

The lump of energy bar Yuuri’s chewing becomes hard to swallow.

He averts his eyes to his closed notebook, heat burning in his cheeks. “Oh…alright then…that’s good,” Yuuri mumbles more to himself than to Christophe. It’s good. It’s fine. There’s no big deal to be made of.

Nothing important at all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mrs. Bin is their senior AP English teacher, and she is…nice.

She wears cashmere sweaters with cats printed all over and sometimes has lipstick on her teeth, but all in all, she’s a nice teacher that most of the students adore. Especially when the adoration is at the expense of senior class treasurer Cao Bin.

“I am _so_ pleased to see some familiar faces in here!” she says while deliberately looking in Yuuri’s direction, causing him to sink further in his chair to somehow escape her gaze. “While we will be dipping our toes in some fine literary works in preparation for the AP exam, I have hopes that we will create some ingenious responses, reflections, and maybe even your own adaptations of the material we are covering in class that can be shared in our own Stammi Vicino Literary Journal!”

Yuuri might as well be the only student in the room, since Mrs. Bin doesn’t even _try_ to look at another student. His body sinks further under the desk, pulling his notebook up to obscure his face.

Mrs. Bin giggles.

“Oh, but I’m getting ahead of myself, aren’t I?” she asks the class with a sigh, then claps her hands. “Why don’t we start with some icebreaker topics to get to know everyone before we go into our summer reading analysis?”

The chorus of groans erupts without a hitch. Mrs. Bin’s cheerful smile doesn’t fall in the slightest.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stammi Vicino High School does not have a literary journal. It has a newspaper, but even _that_ is an exaggeration for what is basically just eight pieces of paper folded together and put out on an end table near the library’s bulletin board. Mostly, the only people that take the newspapers are art students looking for some quick materials for paper mâché. Other than that, no one reads the damn thing.

Phichit is _always_ vocal about how much of a waste of paper it is. ‘ _They do the news on Stammi Vicino TV anyways,_ ’ he normally complains—usually around a mouthful of sausage biscuit from the cafeteria— _‘why is it even relevant???_ ’

Yuuri likes the newspaper though. He likes the journal columns where students send in their own short stories and poems to be published, even under the moniker of ‘Anonymous’. He likes stealthily taking a copy of the newspaper, flipping to the columns section to see his words, his prose, his feelings all in bold, stark ink without those word actually being tied to his name. Because although Yuuri _likes_ having his words out there to be read — or at least given a quick glance at before it is slathered in glue and used in some avant garde paper mâché masterpiece — he’d also be pretty fucking _embarrassed_ if the entire school knew how much of a pathetic and stupid romantic Yuuri Katsuki is.

Mrs. Bin oversees submissions before sending them to print. She’s became a fan of Yuuri’s work ever since.

‘ _Oh, but your words are so_ ** _captivating!_** _Wouldn’t you want just a_ ** _little_** _bit of the recognition?_ ’ she would ask whenever Yuuri tried to discreetly slip her something he was working on.

‘ _Oh god, no, never, please don’t_ ’ or some other variant of his frantic stumbling over words, is usually always his response.

It’s fine though. It’s always been fine. Yuuri doesn’t write to get recognized for it. He writes because he likes it.

After all, he’s already learned his lesson about pouring his heart out for one specific person to read, and he intends to never do it again.

 

* * *

 

 

“What do you think?” Christophe asks whilst wearing a pout on his lips and knitting his eyebrows together.

Yuuri quickly tears his eyes away from where they drifted along the outline of Christophe’s jaw—and when did he get a jawline? And why does Yuuri even find the angle of Christophe’s jawline hot??—in order to survey the mess that is a crowded cafeteria on the first day of school.

“Um, we can always try the quad?” Yuuri suggests, hoping he doesn’t sound too choked up when Christophe turns his eyes on him, and takes a messy swig of his water.

They go to the quad.

It’s significantly worse.

Yuuri tries not to step on people that are sprawled out on the grass with their packed lunches and random lunch trays. He awkwardly sidesteps textbooks and abandoned book bags, until both he and Chris meander their way to a wall that barely has enough space for them to both comfortably sit on.

After they have circled the quad a total of three times, Yuuri offers, “The bleachers? We can try the bleachers?”

Christophe wrinkles his nose. It’s unfairly cute. Yuuri needs to take another messy gulp of water, and some of it drips down his chin onto his shirt.

“It’s smells like feet on the bleachers,” Christophe groans.

“Then the dumpster?” There’s _always_ the tables by the dumpsters. From this distance, Yuuri can see a puddle of disgusting brown liquid seeping from the bottom of the dumpster that is pooling around the vacant table’s legs.

Christophe is already starting towards the direction of the lacrosse field. “The bleachers it is.”

The two take a walk down the pathway where an abundant overgrowth of bare trees flank their left and right, and wet autumn leaves squelch under the soles of their shoes. Christophe talks about his summer to mask the wet noises. He talks about his new job at the mall and about the grueling hours of SAT studying he’s committing to every Tuesday and Thursday evening. Yuuri hangs onto each and every word, when he isn’t focusing on how so often their arms brush against each other as they walk side by side, or how long and pretty Christophe’s eyelashes look viewed through the black fan of Yuuri’s own.

The bleachers are empty when they arrive. It does indeed smell like feet, but the air is crisp and cold enough for it to be only a subtle stench. And when Christophe sits beside Yuuri—pressed up to his side—well, the stink of feet becomes the last thing on Yuuri’s mind.

“So, he told you we broke up, huh?” Christophe asks when he’s popped the lid off his Tupperware and begins to prod at his lunch.

“Um, well. I just noticed you didn’t come to our Friday Night Movie thing and…yeah.”

Christophe shrugs. “I thought it might have been a little too soon,” he explains. “I’ll come around for the next one though. What’re you thinking of watching?”

“Maybe action. Or whatever weird shit Phichit finds.”

Christophe’s smile is soft. “He’s a _master_ of finding weird shit to watch.”

Yuuri’s smile is a perfect mirror. “Yeah. He is.”

They eat in silence for a few moments. The air stings Yuuri’s cheeks, his ears, the tips of his nose. Sometimes, Christophe’s leg brushes against the side of his thigh, causing heat to bite at Yuuri’s skin where the cold only nips.

“Things won’t change between us,” Christophe eventually murmurs. When Yuuri turns to look, Christophe is watching him. The kind sparkle in the boy’s green eyes makes Yuuri give a nervous hiccup as the start of his response.

“O-Of course not,” Yuuri manages to stammer, turning to look away before the _thing_ starts filling his cheeks, his gut, making the tips of his fingers give this aggravating itch and…oh god, it already is. It _has_ been since first period. Since Phichit uttered those three words last Friday night.

Christophe leans against Yuuri, his hair tickling against Yuuri’s cheek. It is a phantom of a touch, but it persists. It tickles. It _burns_.

“You’re my friend too. And I don’t want to stop hanging out with you and things becoming weird between the three of us, okay?”

Yuuri can’t bring himself to even _think_ about turning to look in Christophe’s direction. He tries to take another drink, but all that falls on his tongue is a drop of water.

“R-Right,” he manages to sputter out when he sucks all the air out of the bottle, and it crumples in his sweaty fist. “Sure. Yeah. Friends forever.”

Christophe gives a lazy grin, and he lazily rests his cheek amid Yuuri’s haphazardly brushed hair.

“Friends forever,” he repeats with a chuckle, and takes a bite of his pasta salad, which forces Yuuri to feel the way Christophe moves his jaw against the side of his cranium. It’s…weird. Weird, but strangely nice.

They stay like that for only a minute.

It’s long enough for Yuuri to know he is utterly fucked.

 

* * *

 

 

Sometimes, Yuuri mini-vomits his feelings. Sometimes, he does this _a lot_. Only, instead of talking through his feelings like a sane person would, he just…writes.

His aunt bought him a stationary set for his fifteenth birthday, but Yuuri has been pouring out all the feelings that slip from the bottle in his chest called a ‘heart’—but have not yet jumped off the thing in his mouth called a ‘tongue’—onto paper since he was in the sixth grade.

He penned a letter to Christophe once, in sophomore year. Christophe had surprised Phichit for his closing night as lead in the drama club’s production of _Plaza Suite_ with a bouquet of roses, a box of chocolates, and a tender kiss that is now forever immortalized in the ‘Drama’ section of the yearbook that year. Yuuri’s felt jealous before, and the feelings were like little pricks of his skin that he swatted away before he continued on with his life.

That though? That was a cleave.

Jealous—Yuuri found as he frustratedly scribbled on some old blue stationary paper he found in his father’s office—was very ugly. His jealous handwriting was very ugly, consisting of heavy strokes and blotchy lines from where his hand weighed too heavy with his feelings. His jealous words were _very ugly_. As he wrote, he had the cognizance to let his eyes wander and read every angry and frustrated word he wished to scream out in that moment, but sealed behind a tight lipped smile. The jealous would then get chipped away at by guilt, made him scribble out words he didn’t really mean, until it was becoming too hard for him to write how he felt without wanting to take back everything he said in the first place.

So, he started anew.

He took out a fresh sheet of white paper from his new gifted stationary set, one with a golden embossed border. _Dear Christophe_ , the letter had started, written with a steadied hand that was calmed by a deep breath.

He wrote everything down. The jealous ugly feelings and the guilty ones too. He didn’t cross anything out and he didn’t read over his sentences. He let the words flow from his pen, let the bottle slowly uncork itself and spill.

When the words stopped coming and the burn in his hand that held the pen eased, Yuuri folded the letter up, slipped it into an egg-white envelope, and addressed it. Then, he moved to his closet, took down from the top most shelf a small hat box that once housed his mother’s favorite ‘Sunday picnic hat with the pretty pink bow’, and dropped the letter inside.

Yuuri tucked the box back onto the shelf. The bottle in his chest tightened in resolve.

It’s fine.

No one needs to know.

 

* * *

 

 

“Yuuri, don’t you want to play with me?”

Kenjirou has been asking the same question for the past hour. Normally, Yuuri _does_ like spending time with his younger cousin. But right now, he just wants to curl up on the couch while wrapped up in his quilt, and die. Kenjirou shoving Power Rangers in his face is getting in the way of that.

“Why don’t you ask _Mari_ or someone else?” Yuuri groans, pulling the quilt over his face.

There is no ‘someone else’. Yuuri knows there is no ‘someone else’. ‘Someone else’ would constitute of his father or his aunt, and they both are gone for the weekend at some food and wine festival. Mari is somewhere upstairs; Yuuri hears her music thumping through the ceiling over the Netflix show he’s not watching, but still has playing on the TV.

Kenjirou flops himself over the arm of the couch Yuuri is flopped over. “But I want to play with _you_ ,” he whines.

“I don’t want to play right now, Kenny.”

“Why?”

Yuuri further wraps himself up in his quilt cocoon. “Because I’m depressed.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m a failure of a human being.”

Kenjirou gives an audible gasp. Then, Yuuri feels the weight of a five-year-old child clamber over his head and shoulders before situating on his stomach.

“Nuh- _uh_. You’re like, _amazing_ ,” Kenjirou reprimands. Something starts jabbing into the side of Yuuri’s face again. He can’t see it, but it feels like the fist of Kenjirou’s Power Ranger. “Red Ranger is telling you you’re ‘mazing too. And he’s _always_ right about things, so you should listen!”

Can the Red Ranger tell Yuuri how much of a fuck up he is by having a four year old crush on his friend that is now the ex of his _best_ friend? No.

But he also can’t tell that to Kenjirou either. That would be a quarter in the ‘naughty words’ jar.

“I’ll play with you in five minutes,” Yuuri groans, carefully turning so as to not buck his cousin off and onto the floor. “Just let me stew in my own misery for a second, okay?”

“Okay.” Kenjirou shimmies down Yuuri’s body and off the couch. “I’m gonna leave Red Ranger here with you to keep you company, okay?” he says as he drops the action figure square on Yuuri’s blanketed face.

“Yeah. Whatever.”

 

* * *

 

 

The flyers for Homecoming go up two weeks after school has started. Yuuri has never been the ‘school dance’ kind of guy, or really the kind of guy to do anything that involves _paying_ to be around a bunch of people he doesn’t talk to, when he can be at home in his sweats eating choco-pies or whatever. So all the flyers that get plastered over the lockers and bulletin boards, and all the lunchtime activities that occur during the week, _and_ the morning news announcements reminding people that Homecoming is just ‘ _three_ _more weeks!_ ’, is frankly annoying as fuck.

“Who do you think would be a good date?” Phichit asks Yuuri as they wander through the south hallway towards the junction where Phichit goes to English and Yuuri goes to Calculus. “I’m thinking about Seung-Gil.”

“You mean that emo guy that sits in the corner and doesn’t blink?”

“He _does_ blink,” Phichit says defensively. “And just because he dresses all in black and doesn’t smile often _doesn’t_ make him ‘emo’. He’s got nice eyebrows and the Samoyed puppy keychain he has on his bag _shows_ that deep down, he’s got a soft side. _I_ can bring out that soft side.”

Yuuri doesn’t doubt that. Phichit can wring anything from a person with a curve of his smile and a bat of his eyelashes. He once extorted two TV’s from the AV Club for a Smash tournament, and to this day, Yuuri _still_ hasn’t the faintest clue how Phichit did it.

“What about you?” Phichit then asks, eyebrow raised. “It’s our _last_ Homecoming. You should come!”

Yuuri winces. “I don’t really ‘do’ dancing. Or dates.”

“Then just go with friends! You can always ask Chris to wingman.”

Yuuri trips on air, catching himself before he face plants into the linoleum floor.

“N- _No_. He—I wouldn’t—that’s weird, I can’t—no.” Yuuri’s tongue flops around uselessly in his mouth even though words aren’t forming. His eyes aren’t faring any better, constantly shifting from left to right and looking everywhere but Phichit’s face.

“I’m sure he wouldn’t mind—”

“No. Just, just no. I’m—I’m sure I’ll be studying for an exam during that time anyways or - or something. Mr. Karpisek’s kind of a harass.”

Phichit rolls his eyes with a defeated groan.

“ _Ugh_ , I _knowwww_. What teacher in their right mind would think about giving pop quizzes on material you learned the day before? Why would you torture yourself like that? If _I_ was a teacher, I’d have _one_ test with only _one_ question. And that one question will embody the _essence_ of what I have taught the entire year.”

Yuuri laughs, grateful for the change of conversation. “ _Maybe_ that would work. Or maybe you’d stress your students out even more.”

“There will be no stress allowed in my classroom. Only good vibes.” Phichit adjusts his grip on his bag as he starts to round the corner going right while Yuuri continues left. “We’ll pitch my idea to Mr. Karpisek in Physics later, okay?! Bye!”

Yuuri laughs. “I _doubt_ he’ll take—” His words are cut short the moment he comes in contact with someone, glasses going askew on his nose as he staggers backwards. “O-Oh, I’m sorry—”

“No, no. It’s no big deal—”

Oh.

Yuuri’s came in contact with Victor Nikiforov once before, at Ketty Price’s seventh grade birthday party. Victor, like Chris, has also grown frustratingly handsome over the years. Victor, also like Chris, was a guy Yuuri developed a stupid crush on, poured all his stupid emotions out for them on fine stationary, sealed it up in a stupid little envelope, and pretended those stupid feelings for said guy never happened in the first place.

Except, it’s hard to pretend that those feelings never happened in the first place. Because Victor has one hand raised, and in that hand is the canary yellow envelope Yuuri had sealed those feelings away in all those years ago.

“Um, actually, it’s nice that I bumped into you right now, because I wanna talk about this,” Victor says. His eyes are sparkling and his smile holds something _elated_. Yuuri sees Victor’s lips moving, shaping to form words, sentences, actual spoken _language_. He can’t hear it though. Right now, all Yuuri hears is ‘ _what the fuck what the fuck what the fuck what the_ ** _fuck!!!!_** ’

Mari once joked that between Yuuri and their father, Yuuri had the fastest hands when it came to snatching the last pork cutlet from the dinner plate. Yuuri puts those snatching skills to good use and snatches the envelope from Victor’s hand. The title of ‘Fastest Shredder’ might as well also go to Yuuri, since the moment he gets his sweaty grasp on the envelope and he sees Victor’s address in fourteen-year-old Yuuri’s handwriting, the shit is confetti.

“Where did you get that?” Yuuri questions when _that_ is a heap of colored ripped paper falling like snow between them. “ _Who_ gave you that letter?”

“I—uh—I got it in the mail?” Victor answers. “Was…was I not supposed to?”

“No!”

“…But I liked it?”

Yuuri’s _really_ hot right now, and Victor’s confused puppy dog eyes aren’t! _helping!!_

“You weren’t—that wasn’t— _this_ is not happening right now and _you_ never saw that letter and—”

“Yuuri!”

The calling of his name is the _last_ thing Yuuri wants to hear, especially when the call is coming from _that voice_.

Yuuri turns to look over his shoulder, and Christophe is approaching behind them.

Christophe is approaching behind them with an egg-white envelope in his hand.

“Oh my god,” Yuuri says out loud, a choking noise chasing the words. Oh my god. Oh my _god_.

It feels like everything happens in slow motion. The echoing of Christophe’s sneakers as he draws closer and closer is getting louder and _louder_. The thudding of Yuuri’s heart against his ribcage is getting harder and _harder_. He’s sweating too, _grossly_ sweating all over his face and in his armpits. So not only is Yuuri quickly unraveling into a panicky and fucked mess, but a _sweaty_ , panicky fucked mess.

“Um.” Victor’s voice tries to bring Yuuri back to the nightmare that is reality, “Is there something wrong? Are you okay?”

Obviously, Yuuri isn’t okay.

He’s _so_ not okay that the first thing he does is spin away from Christophe’s steadfast approach, grabs a handful of Victor’s letterman jacket, and yanks Victor down to clumsily smash his mouth against Victor’s nose-cheek-area. Yuuri _thinks_ it looks like they’re kissing, or at least doing something that has caused the sound of Christophe’s footsteps to stutter to a halt. Is it convincing? Maybe? Probably? Yuuri doesn’t know; his mind is honestly a fuckery of chaos, panic, and delirium. All he can hope for is that in the next two seconds, the ground will open up beneath his feet, swallow him whole, and transport him to the center of the universe where he will burn in the Earth’s molten core.

Two seconds later, Yuuri is staring into Victor’s confused eyes and blushing cheeks. Shortly after, Christophe’s footsteps start up again. _Fuck_.

Okay, Plan B.

“You don’t know anything,” Yuuri says hotly, unintentionally shoving Victor harder away than he would have if he wasn’t _freaking out_ , “you _never_ saw that letter.” With that, he runs like hell.

He doesn’t know where he’s running to, doesn’t know _why_ he’s running at all. He hears Christophe shouting at him, but that only scares Yuuri into running faster, hooking a sharp right and hoping that neither Christophe or Victor come chasing after him.

The late bell sounds, but Yuuri is too frazzled to think about turning back around to head towards class. So, he keeps running. Running away from Christophe and his footsteps, from Victor’s blue eyes and blushing cheeks, and from where his feelings messily spilled after being sealed away for _so long_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahhhhhhh I'm planning on this being an every two weeks update style. 2/3 of the story is finished but i just need some time to pace myself with editing and.........school.........OTL


	2. Chapter 2

Victor Nikiforov wasn’t the first boy Yuuri’s written a letter to, wasn’t even the last. But, he _was_ the first boy Yuuri’s ever kissed.

“ _Ooooh_ , the bottle landed on Katsuki,” Ketty had giggled behind her hands all those years ago. “Guess you know that _that_ means.”

Ketty honestly seemed to be the only one that _enjoyed_ playing Spin the Bottle in the corner of her basement, settled among the crates that housed her father’s records. Two kids had excused themselves from the circle to go get some cake upstairs and never came back. Another kid had to go to the bathroom, and _also_ never came back. Ketty didn’t invite many people to her birthday party, and frankly, Yuuri was running out of places to kiss the other three remaining players in the circle that _weren’t_ the mouth.

Victor Nikiforov had been gracious with his kisses. So far, he kissed Yuuri two times on the stomach, Ketty three times on her cheek, and Leo de la Iglesia four times on the nose. His excuse was not wanting someone to cut their lip on his braces, but Yuuri was exploiting the ‘no mouth’ loophole on the basis that no one said he _couldn’t_.

He began to lift his poodle sweater for another wet one on the belly button, and Victor began to stoop his head down with a smile on his lips, when Ketty suddenly karate chopping the air made them gave pause.

“No!” she snapped, the frustrated look given to Yuuri rather than Victor’s compliance, “on the _lips_ this time!”

Victor’s expectant blue eyes turned to Yuuri for approval.

“Uh…are you okay with that?” he asked.

If Yuuri were being ninety-nine-point-nine percent honest with himself, he would have already been running away from the circle and out of Ketty’s house while screaming like a maniac.

But there’s that point one percent of him that looked at how soft Victor’s mouth was, that point one percent that _knew_ how soft Victor’s lips felt when pressed against his stomach, and that point one percent that wondered if Victor’s lips would feel any different if they were pressed against the tight seam of Yuuri’s mouth.

“Um, no,” Yuuri muttered under his breath. He pulled his sweater down, but kept his hands clutched over his belly. “I don’t mind.”

Victor nodded. Ketty beamed. Leo excused himself to go to the bathroom.

On his hands and knees, Victor leaned in close to Yuuri’s face. His mouth smelled like pink lemonade lip balm, was pink and shiny too. When Victor parted his lips ever so slightly, Yuuri could catch a glimpse at the silver in the other boy’s mouth.

“Um, we shouldn’t have tongue. In case…you know,” Victor murmured as a warning when his lips were close enough that his breath ghosted over Yuuri’s trembling lips. Yuuri nodded, as much as he _could_ nod with Victor’s face _so fucking close_ , and just let it happened.

It was a brief kiss. But Yuuri was fourteen and Victor was cute, so it felt like it stretched for an eternal pocket of time.

When Victor pulled away, Yuuri chased after his retreating mouth with his own, eyelashes all a flutter. The only thing that was able to break Yuuri out of the nirvana he was swimming in, warmth in his cheeks moving down his heck and chest, was the sound of Ketty squealing excitedly beside him.

“Okay! Okay! _My turn!!_ ” she shouted, making a grab for the bottle.

“U-Um.” Yuuri staggered to his feet, arms wrapped around his stomach as his knees wobbled. “I—I think I got to go to the bathroom.”

Ketty’s face dropped. “Why does _everyone_ need to go to the bathroom?!”

The butterflies in Yuuri’s stomach threaten to lodge in his throat if he didn’t get the hell away from Victor, with his curious blinking eyes and his curious touching at his pink lemonade coated lips. The touch was what bothered Yuuri the most; the way Victor swiped his index finger over his bottom lip as if Yuuri was still kissing him made a phantom twitch appear against Yuuri’s own mouth.

“J-Just a few seconds,” Yuuri stammered, and he hurried up the stairs of the basement, bypassed the upstairs bathroom entirely, and continued his merry way out the front door to…get some air.

Mari didn’t ask many questions on why was it that when she came to pick Yuuri up two hours later, he was sitting outside on the curb three houses away from Ketty’s. Nor did she wonder about Yuuri’s sudden insistence to stop by the arts and crafts store on their way home, and purchase some stationery paper and bright colored envelopes.

 

* * *

 

In the present time, Yuuri is currently ‘not crying’ in the boy’s bathroom on the first floor of building E.

It is by far the best bathroom to ‘not cry’ in. The stalls are forty percent cleaner than literally every other boy’s bathroom on the school campus and the stink of urinal cakes isn’t _as_ nauseating. Yuuri doesn’t know if he was followed, but he hasn’t heard anyone come in since he threw himself into the nearest open stall and locked the door shut behind him, then crawled onto the toilet to sit there and ‘not cry’.

It’s been twenty minutes. Another forty more, and he can blend in with the crowd of students transitioning to fifth period. It’s fine. He’s fine waiting. It gives him more time to think of a counter-strategy for this mess he’s got himself into.

Two letter got out. _Somehow_ two letters got out, one of them being the most shameful letter Yuuri’s ever wrote. He can play it off as a joke to Christophe, can’t he? The letter is old, Yuuri can _completely_ claim that he wrote it in sophomore year and that he doesn’t have feelings for Christophe _now_.

Except…there’s a little part of him, just a teensy-tiny-itty-bitty part that doesn’t want to do that. That teensy-tiny-itty-bitty part of him is currently chipping away at the bottle called his heart, willing the emotions to come flooding without restraint. That teensy-tiny-itty-bitty part of him can’t allow Yuuri to say he doesn’t feel his insides twist themselves into fine knots when Christophe laughs or smiles or _exists_ within a five mile radius of Yuuri’s person.

Because deep down, that teensy-tiny-itty-bitty part of Yuuri Katsuki can’t lie about his feelings any longer.

Yuuri drops his face into his hands. God, he’s so fucked.

The doors to the bathroom open with a sudden clang. Yuuri immediately pulls his feet up onto the toilet rim, hoping that the loud thudding of his heart doesn’t sound as loud as it does in his ears. Whoever comes inside hastily shuffles into the bathroom stall right next to Yuuri, clumsily closing the door shut behind them. There is the audible sound of pants being unbuttoned, unzipped.

Then, the most godawful smell penetrates Yuuri’s nose so quickly that he doesn’t even have the time to gag, or to _close his mouth_.

Yuuri decides that he’s had enough ‘not crying’ by the third pained grunt and wet fart he hears occurring in the next door stall. He keeps his hands over his nose and mouth, convincing his lungs to just not take in any air at all for the next few seconds as he shambles out of the bathroom that is quickly turning into a war zone on the nostrils. Yuuri is so caught up in both breathing-and-not-breathing, that he clumsily runs into _another_ person in his escape, a large clipboard falling in between their feet on impact.

“I’m—” Yuuri wheezes, coughs, gags, then catches his breath—“I’m sorry! I wasn’t looking!"

“Oh no, it’s fine, Bro.” The guy stoops down to pick up the clipboard that has ‘ **HALL PASS** ’ written over its backside in large Sharpie ink, tucking it under his arm. When Yuuri gets a good look at the guy’s face, he blanches white.

It’s Jean-Jacques Leroy.

And he’s gotten a lot cuter since sophomore year.

 _And_ when he notices it’s Yuuri that he’s ran into, he reaches into the pocket of his letterman jacket to unveil a small lavender envelope with his address that fifteen-year-old Yuuri Katsuki penned.

“Uh, so.” JJ turns the envelope in between his fingers. “I got this in the mail this morning and was gonna ask you about this if I managed to see you at lunch but, since you’re here right _now_ , you wanna…talk?”

Yuuri knows that his only place to hide within close distance is in the bathroom behind him, but he knows the probability of him escaping that bathroom is close to zero. He _also_ knows that JJ is ’scary jock’ levels when it comes to running and would catch Yuuri the _second_ he tries to turn tail and bolt.

In other words, he’s trapped.

Yuuri tucks his chin down towards his chest. “U-Um, sure. Let’s…talk.”

 

 

 

 

 

Jean-Jacques Leroy wasn’t the first boy Yuuri’s written a letter to. He wasn’t the first boy Yuuri ever kissed. But he _was_ the first boy that stuck his tongue in Yuuri’s mouth.

Ketty Price was celebrating her sixteenth birthday. Because Yuuri didn’t learn his lesson the first time and accepted the invite, and because Ketty had some weird fascination with humiliating party games, Yuuri wound up stuck in the upstairs closet with JJ for ‘seven minutes in Heaven’.

“Now behave you two~” Ketty had chimed with a playful wink while the freshman football team crowed behind her. She closed the door shut, audibly locked it, but didn’t drift too far away since Yuuri could still hear her giggling just behind the door.

The closet is small and cramped, overstuffed with cardboard boxes and suits wrapped in plastic. There were fur coats that smelled like moth balls and dust and it was dark. _Very_ dark. He tried to feel around the wall for a light switch and even blindly swiped at the ceiling in case there was a cord, but only ended up swatting JJ in the face.

“I-I’m sorry!” Yuuri apologized to where he _thought_ JJ’s face was. Shortly after, a harsh white light illuminated JJ’s smile.

“It’s fine,” he said, cellphone in hand.

They stood there awkwardly for a few seconds. Yuuri tried to get comfortable with all the coats and boxes that forced him closer into JJ’s personal bubble.

Soon, JJ gave a nervous cough. “So, um, I’m not gay.”

Yuuri nodded, keeping his eyes averted. “Uh, yeah. That’s fine.”

“I’m just saying—you know— just so _you_ know. I mean, I wouldn’t _mind_ kissing you, but I’m just letting you know that I’m not gay.”

“We really don’t have to kiss if you don’t want to, JJ.” Yuuri tried to step over a fallen hat box, only to trip on a fallen leather coat and fall into JJ’s arms. Instead of quickly shoving Yuuri away, JJ…held him, a secure hand on Yuuri’s hip to steady him. JJ’s body was already shaping and growing into a high school quarterback champion. He also—from this close intimacy—smelled really nice. Like maple syrup and mint leaves.

“Well, I mean, I don’t _mind_ kissing you,” JJ stressed. The glow of his phone didn’t hide at all the blush that spread on his cheeks. “You’re…um…you’re really cute…and you’ve got a nice figure…but I mean it in a straight way! Like how girls say other girls are cute kinda way, except we’re both guys. A-And there’s not anything _wrong_ with being gay, but, you know, I’m just saying… _I’m_ not.”

Yuuri gave a glance at the lock screen of JJ’s phone. Only one minute has passed. He wasn’t sure if he could go through six more.

“JJ, it’s either a yes or a no. Do you _want_ to kiss me?” Yuuri asked with a frustrated sigh. Because, it wasn’t like Yuuri _minded_ kissing JJ. Yuuri once saw him during a football practice after the ‘incident’. JJ was covered in grass stains and squiring water from his bottle all over his sweaty face. Maybe it was Yuuri’s brain trying to get over Christophe that made the sight strangely hotter to him than he would have figured. Maybe it made JJ seem more endearing with his boyish blue eyes and his cute smile (when he wasn’t using it to talk like an idiot).

In the glow of the cellphone light, JJ turned scarlet.

Then, he nodded his head once, and leaned in to meet Yuuri halfway.

Yuuri expected a closed-mouth kiss, was anticipating it to be only a short peck. But JJ’s tongue prodded against Yuuri’s bottom lip two seconds after their mouths easily slotted against each other, and the sudden wetness startled Yuuri enough for him to gasp against JJ’s mouth and for JJ to immediately take advantage of the opening.

It was weird.

It was _really_ weird.

But also…Yuuri _really_ liked it.

He doesn’t know how long they spent kissing—the moment Yuuri realized there was a chewed up wad of gum in his mouth that wasn’t there before was the moment time ceased to exist—but the sudden yanking open of the closet door ended the kissing session quickly. Yuuri’s hands were tightly wound in JJ’s hair when the door opened. Meanwhile, JJ had a good amount of Yuuri’s butt in his right hand and was tenderly holding Yuuri by the back of his neck with his left.

Ketty’s mother was standing in the doorway, her round face three shades of purple. Behind her, the football players were still howling.

With his hands still in JJ’s hair and JJ’s hand still squeezing his ass, Yuuri tried to apologize. If their hands weren’t in those places—and also if JJ’s gum didn’t fall out of Yuuri’s mouth onto a satin pink hat box between their feet mid-apology—it would have been a _lot_ more sincere.

 

* * *

 

“So, that letter was kind of wild. And also, like, _really_ cute,” JJ says now as the captain and star quarterback of Stammi Viccino’s varsity football team. Yuuri doesn’t know what to be more embarrassed about, the fact that JJ called his letter ‘cute’ or the fact that JJ called his letter ‘cute’ while in the middle of taking a piss. Probably the latter.

“You weren’t supposed to have seen it,” Yuuri grumbles, frustrated.

“Why? Was it some secret?”

“Yes! Oh my god, I didn’t want you to _know_ about how I felt when you were kissing me! That’s weird!”

“It wasn’t a _bad_ moment though,” JJ says, flushing the urinal and wandering over to the sinks where Yuuri stands to wash his hands. “I mean, all this time I thought I was _pretty_ straight. I had no problems with guys liking dudes and stuff, and even _I_ had moments where I thought some guys at our school were really cute. But I just thought that wasn’t me, you know? But at the same time, it was getting hard to just push those feelings aside, you know? Like, objectively _I’m_ the best looking guy on campus, so for me to think a guy was cute was a _big deal_. You should take it as a compliment for me thinking you’re cute, actually. When you were biting your lip when we were closet? _Super_ cute.”

“Oh my god.” Yuuri wants to die. He _literally_ wants a meteor to strike him right _now_.

“So like, when we kissed, it was _eye-opening_. Like, cute guys are just as nice to kiss as cute girls are! And like, after that happened, everything just made _sense_. So, reading how you felt when I kissed you made me happy! Cause you made _me_ feel _really_ good too. Like, I think I jerked it to you for like, two weeks after Ketty’s party.”

“Oh my _god_.” A meteor! A bolt of lightning! A plague of locusts! Something! Anything! Just take Yuuri out of his misery already!!!

JJ rips a paper towel off to dry his hands. “But, just so you know, I’m currently dating Isabella right now, so I can’t, you know, reciprocate? I still think you’re super cute though, but we can totally be bros!” JJ throws up a handsign that forms two J’s. “Being best friends with me would be the _next_ best thing after dating me, so you should take this chance while you can!”

Oh. My. _Gooooooodddddd_.

What did Yuuri do to deserve this happening to him? He’s a good person. He volunteers at the animal shelter. He _recycles_. Why does the universe hate him???

“Listen, JJ. I just—I just really want to forget this entire thing even happened,” Yuuri is able to get out before JJ can reduce him to an incomprehensible puddle of embarrassed goo. “I’m really glad that I—um—helped you… _explore_ your options in sexuality or whatever. But, I’m really over it. I’m _super_ over it. Everything in that letter was all in the past.”

JJ doesn’t have on a difficult expression. He throws on a smile that pulls across his face from ear to ear, and Yuuri curses his body that the smile is _still_ able to wring a warm feeling at the bottom of his gut.

“It’s cool! Like I said, we can still be bros! I’m _always_ down to hang out with new bros! Oh! You wanna hang with me and Isabella at Almavivo Social after school today? They got some _really_ good chicken wings and they _just_ installed a bowling alley!” JJ gushes.

Yuuri wants to ask JJ why would he think inviting the guy that apparently facilitated his bisexual awakening to hang out with his now current girlfriend like it was no big deal was a good idea. But that would be dumb, because it _really isn’t_ a big deal. JJ wanting to be best friends is actually the _least_ worrisome aftermath of this letter nightmare.

“Um. No, no. That’s okay. I have things I need to do,” Yuuri laughs off.

“Then some other time! You got Snapchat?”

Yuuri does indeed have Snapchat. He also has an Instagram, a Twitter, and a LINE. The last time he’s used any of them was when Phichit pestered him to get on social media three years ago.

“Uh. Yeah. Sure.”

They exchange information with each other in pleasant silence. JJ offers to walk Yuuri to class afterwards, like any bro would, but Yuuri politely declines. He thinks he can wait out the rest of his class period in _this_ bathroom at least, unless someone else decides to mosey in here and decimate it with a hellacious shit.

“I’ll see you around, Bro!” JJ says with a departing wave of his hand, before he disappears out the bathroom door and presumably back to whatever class he excused himself from. Yuuri, meanwhile, retreats into a bathroom stall and sits himself upon a liner-covered seat, knees pulled up to his chest and backpack draped over the crooked metal hook on the door.

He sighs.

Back to ‘not crying’.

 

 

 

 

Fifth and six period are spent by Yuuri assessing the best and worst possible outcomes while half listening to the lectures. The best outcomes would be that only those three letters got out. An even _better_ outcome would be that this is all some horrible dream and Mari will wake him up any second now for some hastily thrown together breakfast.

He spent the entirety of sixth period pinching himself, and is certain his desk-mate must think he is insane.

Phichit doesn’t act any differently. He chatted with Yuuri about the usual bullshit when they were supposed to be doing worksheets, shown Yuuri the same normal amount of memes on his cellphone during Physics, and didn’t even _mention_ Christophe’s name.

He did mention Seung-Gil’s name. Phichit talked _a lot_ about Seung-Gil.

“He’s _sooo_ cute, Yuuri. I’m seriously going to die at how nice his handwriting is,” Phichit groans to Yuuri as they pack up to leave sixth and subsequently go to towards the bike racks in the outside west quad. He’s looking at a page of notes he has clutched tightly in his hands and is smiling at it. The paper doesn’t look like anything spectacular in Yuuri’s own opinion; he’s not even sure how Phichit can even swoon over Seung-Gil’s handwriting when Seung-Gil writes so small that Yuuri can’t even _tell_ where the writing is.

“So…are you two going to be a…thing?”

Phichit hums. “Maybe? I don’t want to freak him out by coming on too strong, so I’ll just wait on that.” The boy’s smile gets cheeky and he slaps a spot in between Yuuri’s shoulder blades. “Besides, it’s too soon after the break-up! I’m not looking to rebound or anything!”

Yuuri swallows hard. He doesn’t make any further comments.

They arrive at the bike racks with little conversation spoken between them. Phichit got his driver license last year. He used to make an offer of driving Yuuri to and from school, but Yuuri’s turn him down so many times that now all that comes on Phichit’s lip is just a twitch instead of the question. “Are you thinking about going still?” Phichit asks instead when Yuuri crouches down to unlock his bike. “It’ll be fun, and in the off-chance everything totally whomps with Seung-Gil, it’ll be fun to hang out with you and Chris.”

The lock slips from Yuuri’s grasp, his palms suddenly sweaty.

“N-No. I _really_ can’t go,” Yuuri says, the warble in his voice obvious by how Phichit quirks an eyebrow in small worry. Yuuri hides his face before the panic escapes in other ways—a twitch of his eye or a twist of his moue, some unlearned tell that Phichit has mastered in finding. “I-I’ll call you when I get home.”

“…Okay?…Hey, is there something—”

“Hey! Hey! _Hey!_ ”

Yuuri’s head whips up the same time that Phichit’s turn to look over the shoulder. Victor Nikiforov is struggling through the crowd of exiting students coming down the steps, but his eyes are focused on Yuuri and his hand is outstretched like to grab Yuuri and hold him before he can flee.

Which, haha, as if _that’s_ going to happen.

“U-Uh! I gotta—” Yuuri doesn’t finish his sentence or acknowledge the way how Phichit’s face changes from worry to that of confusion and slight amusement. He throws himself onto the seat of his bike, and takes off with a wobbly jolt forward.

If Victor continues to shout for him, Yuuri does not hear it over the thudding of his heart and the crunch of gravel beneath the spinning wheels.

 

* * *

 

“Mari! _MARI!_ ” is the first thing Yuuri screams when he haphazardly dumps his bike on the front porch and runs to his room, only to find that the silk hat box he tucked away in his closet is devoid of _all_ letters. His sister doesn’t come to his room the first time he screams, so he then proceeds to run to her room next door and scream her name even louder.

“ _What?!_ What is it?!” Mari startles herself from where she was seated at her study table, headphones getting thrown off her head by her sudden jerk upwards. Yuuri offers forward the empty hat box, his skin _burning_ and heart ready to leap out of his chest.

“They’re gone! The letters! The—did you—how did they—where did they _even_ —and _why were they_ —”

“Yuuri, Yuuri, you’re not making any sense—” Mari slides her headphones off to place by her open notebook, moving to hold Yuuri still to keep him from pacing around the clutter of her room. “What’s going on? _Breathe_ and tell me.”

It’s difficult to breathe. It’s difficult to _think_. Yuuri has to swallow a couple of gulps of air before he can utter a word, but he still feels as though he’s being choked and his body just won’t _stop trembling_.

“The—I wrote letters and kept them all in this hat box and I said things in those letters I _really_ didn’t want people to find out about and now they’re _gone_ and people _have them_ and I just—” Yuuri drops the hat box at their feet to drop his face into his hands. “Everything is just _ruined_ now and I don’t know what to _do_.”

“Well what did you say in the letters? They might not be as _bad_.”

“I said some _really_ stupid stuff. Really _embarrassing_ stuff.” Yuuri peeks between his fingers. “Y-You didn’t take them, did you? Or know anyone that went into my room and took them?”

“Yuuri, you get anal about me moving your _toothbrush_ to the other side of the sink. Why would you think I’d go into your room and _take_ something?” Mari says dryly. The jab—for some reason—makes Yuuri feel better, despite the petulant frown that appears on his twisting mouth.

“I do not.”

“You do too.”

“I do _not_.”

“You do _too_.”

“I do not—okay, this is distracting me from the _bigger problem_ here.”

“What about Dad?” Mari then suggests. She starts to coax Yuuri to the foot of her bed, sitting him down where she still has some clothes needing to be folded and placed in her drawer chest still sprawled out over her bedspread. “He might have mailed them?”

Yuuri shakes his head. “N-No. He would have told me he mailed them if he did,” he murmurs under his breath, worrying his hands together and biting his lip. But then that eliminates the only people that _could_ have mailed the letters, because Yuuri sure as hell didn’t go delirious and mail the letters himself.

His face finds the palms of his hands again. Why? _Why did this happen??_

“…Who did the letters go to?” Mari’s voice floats in his ear. She sounds further away, most likely taking a seat back at her desk. “Someone far away?”

Yuuri shakes his head ‘no’.

“Someone close by?”

Yuuri shakes his head ‘yes’.

“…Someone you know?”

Another shake of the head ‘yes’.

“Then if they weren’t supposed to get those letters, you can just tell them it was a mistake and ask for them back,” Mari says, then, “and if they _don’t_ give them back, I’ll beat the shit out of them until they cough it up.”

Yuuri peeks through his fingers. “I-I don’t need you to do that.”

Mari sniffs. “Yeah, but the offer is on the table if you ever want it.”

Yuuri hums.

He doesn’t get up immediately from Mari’s bed. Instead, he sits and thinks and sits and thinks some more. Mari lets him, turning back to the open book on her desk but leaving her headphones off, just in case Yuuri wants to talk about it, or talk about his feelings, or just _talk_ in general.

But he doesn’t.

 

* * *

 

In sixth grade, Yuuri went to his first school dance.

It wasn’t anything spectacular, but it _was_ horribly awkward. Phichit tried to make it fun though, and Yuuri always regretted that he made Phichit waste a majority of the night hugging the wall with him instead of dancing and laughing and being the social butterfly Phichit is.

“What do you think about her? She’s pretty, right?” Phichit asked while he nursed his fourth cup of punch. He was pointing with his eyes at some girl who was hugging the wall opposite of Yuuri. Her blond hair was held up with too much hairspray and even from this distance, Yuuri saw she was wearing _way_ too much eyeshadow.

“N-No. Not really—um—I don’t really want to dance,” Yuuri murmured. He wasn’t a good dancer anyways. If he wasn’t busy tripping over his own two feet, then he’d be stepping on the feet of others. The night was almost done with anyways with very few people left to dance with, so why even bother now?

Phichit made a face, something between a pout and the tail-end of a sneeze. “But dances are _where_ you dance! It’s in the name!”

Yuuri tucked his chin towards his chest, hands wringing behind his back.

“I’m sorry—”

“N-No, don’t apologize,” Phichit quickly got out, tone apologetic enough. “It’s alright. I bet you just couldn’t dance to this lame music they’re playing. Like, there’s no beat to it or anything.” To demonstrate, Phichit started snapping his fingers. He found the beat of the synth that was blaring over the speakers too quickly for his hypothesis to be valid, so he then began to snap off-beat. It didn’t make Yuuri feel at all better.

“I’ll call my mom,” Yuuri muttered and reached for his cellphone in the back of his pocket. “It’s getting kinda late anyways.”

Phichit is a fast learner; he hid his disappointment with a laugh and nod of his head. “Yeah, I guess,” he said with sigh and swallowed down the rest of his punch. “‘M gonna go to the bathroom real quick. Hopefully Stinky Sam didn’t destroy it after he ate half of the buffet,” Phichit then bemoaned with a dramatic sigh. It garnered a chuckle from Yuuri, but his chest was still squeezing tight.

He ruined the night.

He ruined everything.

He was a bad friend.

Phichit disappeared out the double doors with a wave goodbye, and Yuuri was left alone by the wall. It would take his mother about ten to fifteen minutes to arrive to the school, but she responded immediately with a happy little emoticon and a promise to be there ‘as fast as she can!!!’

The music seemed as though it was extra loud with the lack of people present. The sound vibrated off the walls and the rows of metal chairs that were pressed against them, and they made Yuuri’s head throb something mean. He brought a hand to his temple and closed his eyes tight. He hated dances, he was _never_ going to do this again. At least in the future, Phichit won’t have anyone to hold him back from his fun, so Yuuri would be doing him an immense favor.

“Hey.”

Yuuri opened his eyes at the sudden voice in front of him, and they were met with blue eyes that were sparkling right back and an open hand being offered towards him. “You—uh—you wanna dance?”

There was a pause. Yuuri blinked his eyes wildly.

“…Dance?…You want to dance with _me?_ ”

The boy nodded, smile not faltering. It was a charming kind of smile, not glamorous in a Hollywood kind of way or rogue and dashing like a model’s were, but with the way the fuchsia and blue disco lights flashed over the contours of the boy’s face, it made something warm settle in Yuuri’s stomach from having that smile directed at him.

“Yeah. I mean, I thought that you and that other guy were going to dance, but you kinda just hung around here all night. And this dance was kinda a bust since my friends couldn’t come, so, you know, I want to have _some_ fun and you seem pretty cute so…” the guy shot Yuuri some finger guns and offered his hand again. The warmth in Yuuri’s stomach turned to a simmer. “Do you want to dance?”

Yuuri spent another beat of silence just blinking in shock. Not once did the boy drop his hand back to his side.

“I…I’m not a really good dancer,” Yuuri tried to excuse, but the boy shook his head.

“It’s okay. I’m not either,” he confided with a laugh and wow. Yuuri was burning, in his stomach and his cheeks and he wasn’t sure how to deal with that. His lack of response made the boy hesitate, though he still continued to smile. “But, you know, if you don’t want to dance, I won’t be offended or anything.”

“N-No, I—” Yuuri swallowed a well of spit that formed in his mouth too quickly, and with one hand clutched into a fist at his side, he took the boy’s hand with the other. “I don’t mind dancing…”

The boy’s hand was warm, and he _squeezed_ Yuuri’s tight. “I’m Emil, by the way,” the boy—Emil, with the pretty blue eyes and the cute gentle smile—introduced as he lead Yuuri to the center of the gym floor.

“Yuuri,” Yuuri answered back, before he let the music and Emil’s smile take him away if only for a few minutes.

 

 

 

 

“Did you two enjoy yourself?” Yuuri’s mother asked when Yuuri slid into the passenger seat and had Emil’s phone number written on a loose napkin folded up in his pocket.

“It was alright,” Phichit said with a shrug from his spot on the backseat, texting his own mother he was going to spend the night with the Katsukis.

Yuuri’s hand still felt warm from Emil holding it. “Yeah,” he murmured, a bit dazed. “It was alright.”

 

 

 

 

The poem conveying the newfound and confusing feelings Yuuri had felt upon Emil taking his hand and smiling the way that he did was written underneath the covers of Yuuri’s bed, Phichit asleep a few feet away on the floor. By the end of it, Yuuri had felt too hot to comfortably fall asleep. And if it wasn’t his cheeks that made an uncomfortable sting every time he smushed his face against his pillow, it was the twist and turn and knotting of his stomach over guilt for having just a _little_ bit of fun after ruining Phichit’s night.

He resolved himself to two things:

1) Yuuri Katsuki would never sacrifice Phichit’s happiness for his own.

2) The letter to Emil would _never_ be brought to light.

It’s alright.

It’s alright.

 

* * *

 

It’s alright, it’s _alright_. Yuuri has been repeating that mantra since the Letter-pocalypse occurred. It is the only thing that was keeping him sane. Or rather, the only thing that was _tricking_ himself into thinking he was sane when he was just toddling on the edge of another panic attack.

In the midst of panic, he has devised a small plan. It was the second best plan that he could come up with, since his first best plan involved him dropping out of high school and flying to France where he’d change his name and live a new life, the only problem being that he a) can’t speak French and b) isn’t making that much money down at the video rental store to even _think_ of buying a ticket to France.

The plan consists of these three simple steps:

Step 1: Confront Emil and destroy Letter #1

Step 2: Properly explain to Victor about Letter #2 and hope that he will just leave Yuuri alone for the rest of all eternity

Step 3: Talk to Christophe about Letter #3 and properly excuse himself from the rest of Christophe’s life

It seems very simple, but at the same time the most terrifying thing he’ll have to do his entire life. Next to parallel parking.

 

 

 

 

Christophe is absent from first period. Phichit brings up something about Christophe having caught a cold when he and Yuuri meet in Physics, and will visit him after school to see how he’s doing.

“Just because he’s probably eating himself up inside about missing class,” Phichit excuses without Yuuri even asking for it. They’ve got a worksheet out in front of them that’s half filled; Phichit turns his pencil in between his fingers while his eyes wander aimlessly around the room. “Maybe I’ll get him some soup. Soup is good for colds, right?”

“He’d like that, I’m sure,” Yuuri answers with a smile.

“You wanna come with? Maybe we could have a Wednesday Movie Night at his place or something.”

Yuuri is already vehemently shaking his head ‘no’. “I-I have somewhere I need to be after school. So—um—maybe some other time…”

Phichit’s eyebrows are doing the Thing again, knitting themselves together as he bites the inside of his cheek and ponders whether or not to question whatever _thing_ he’s sensing from Yuuri’s posture and voice. Yuuri tries his best to ignore it, pointing a problem neither of them had worked on. “Um, so what do you think about the answer to this?”

After a pause, Phichit takes the bait. “I don’t know,” he groans, then looks to his right. “ _But_ I bet Seung-Gil might know a thing or two~”

“Please get answers and not just do shameless flirting,” Yuuri begs.

“So little faith in my abilities to get both!” Phichit gasps, before giving a wink and sauntering over to the other side of the room. Yuuri watches him go with a smile, before turning his own attention back to his paper. Stay focused on the goal. Stay focused on the _plan_.

Sixth period comes and goes. Phichit forgoes walking Yuuri to the bike racks and instead says his farewells at the door of the classroom before going in the direction of the student parking. Yuuri waits until Phichit has disappeared in the crowd of students before he goes in the opposite direction, down a set of stairs that leads out of the building and takes him to the swimming pools.

The smell of chlorine cuts through the air as Yuuri circles around the back of the fence, trying to remain as inconspicuous as he possibly can. As far as athletes most likely to be assholes, the boys water polo team isn’t that type of crowd. Then again, Yuuri has only truly became acquainted with the boys football team, so his perception of asshole athlete _may_ be a tad bit skewed.

He sees a small handful of them gathering on the bleachers, while some linger by the pool and wait for the others to come out of the locker room. It takes a moment, but Yuuri eventually is able to pick Emil out of the crowd by the smile on his face.

 _Dammit,_ Yuuri thinks as he shifts over to the metal gate and teases it open, _why did everyone get_ ** _hot??_**

Yuuri holds his breath as he slowly approaches the huddle of half-naked guys rubbing themselves up with sunscreen, not sure where his eyes can focus on but _begging_ they do not wander south of the navel. Emil isn’t the first one to notice Yuuri coming towards them at the speed of a shambling zombie though. That’s some other guy.

“Can we help you?” his voice immediately cuts into the conversation, eyes staring harshly at Yuuri and lips curling in a frown. The chatter dies down as heads turn to curiously look, eyebrows quirked and heads cocked. Yuuri resists every itch and urge in his body to turn and _fucking run_ ; instead, he forces a smile on his lips that clenches too tight at the corners of his mouth.

“U-Um.” Yuuri’s voice squeaks, and he gives a rough clearing of his throat. “H-Hi. So—um—I know I’m not supposed to be here technically, but—um—I just wanted to talk to Emil really quick?”

“We have practice,” the guy speaks for Emil, frown deepening. “Talk to him _later_.”

“Hold on, Mickey~” Emil cuts in with a lackadaisical sigh, stepping forward towards Yuuri.

In the span of a second that Yuuri’s eyes go over the definition of Emil’s body, the scruff of his chin, and the shine of his boyish blue eyes, Yuuri both hates himself and is feeling utterly blessed.

“It’s just a quick chat. Practice hasn’t even started yet,” he tells the scowling boy. Then with a gesture of his head to the locker rooms, he then adds, “In fact, we should see what’s taking Samuel and Alonzo so long. They might be getting into some… _activities_.” Emil punctuates this with a waggle of his eyebrows. Mickey turns a scarlet shade that Yuuri can’t separate from anger or embarrassment.

“Not on my watch!” Mickey snaps, before stomping off to the locker room with the rest of the huddle following behind him snickering.

Emil turns to Yuuri, giving a sheepish rub of the back of his neck. “Sorry about Mickey. He can get a little intense about practice regimens being interrupted. But hey! It’s been a long time!” The boy opens his arms up for a hug, and Yuuri stupidly walks right into it and _lets_ him wrap his arms tight around him. Emil doesn’t smell like chlorine, Yuuri finds. The scent is more like the last remnants of soap and a few spritzes of body spray. His skin is warm and soft against Yuuri’s cheek and he’s also growing just a _little_ bit of chest hair, which _ugh_ , _whyyyyy_ does Yuuri find that hot too???

“U-Um, yeah. It’s—It’s been a while,” Yuuri mumbles half into Emil’s sternum.

“What brings you around these parts? You’re usual crowd is the football players, right? You still dating Worthington?”

Yuuri’s eyes avert to Emil’s bare feet, and he pushes himself out of the warm embrace to wrap arms around himself.

“No. We broke up last year.”

Something flickers across Emil’s face that Yuuri doesn’t quite understand—his eyebrows raise, his eyes widen, his lips shape into an ‘oh’ and then, an awkward laugh.

“Oh? Um. Wow. That…sucks.”

Yuuri nods his head. “Yeah. It sucks.” Biting his lip, he clears his throat. “U-Um, but that’s not what I wanted to talk about. Did you…did you get a letter from me that talked about us dancing in middle school?”

Emil nods his head ‘yes’.

“Did you…tell anyone about it?”

“No? Why would I? Seemed pretty personal. And also, _really_ creative.” Emil laughs, rubbing at his neck again. “I didn’t know there were _that_ many ways to describe my eyes.”

Immediately, Yuuri drops his face into his hands. “ _I’m so sorry_ —” he apologizes into his palms, but Emil pulls his hands down and away, a crooked thumb rubbing crooked circles against where Yuuri’s pulse beats mad.

“Hey, hey. I _really_ liked your letter,” Emil reassures. He’s blushing. Why is _he_ blushing??

“U-Um, I just—I didn’t mean for that letter to get out. I wrote it a long time ago and I was _really_ embarrassing so, I just wanted to explain to you that it was an accident and I hope I didn’t weird you out with it,” Yuuri furthers in his apology.

“It’s okay, really.” Emil ducks his head down for a nervous laugh, and he squeezes Yuuri’s hands tight. “I mean, I got a little confused cause I thought you were still with Worthington, but since you two broke up…and this happened…I don’t know, I’ve been wondering a lot about you since middle school and—”

“EMIL! _OI! WE’RE GOING TO START PRACTICE!_ ”

Mickey’s voice comes screaming from the direction of the locker room, the boy marching out with two others that weren’t involved in the huddle trailing after him. As they come closer, Yuuri sees the collarbones of the two boys are lined with a dotting of hickeys. They are very adamant at not looking at any of their teammates’ smartass grins.

Yuuri pulls his hands away from Emil’s grasp, backing away towards the gate.

“Um, that’s it! I just—I’ll let you get to your practice! But, if you could just forget everything that I said in that letter and give it to me so I can just—you know—destroy it? I’d—I’d _really_ appreciate it!”

With a hurried wave to Emil’s confused face, Yuuri runs out the metal gate and towards the nearest quad.

It is only when he pauses by a tree to catch his breath that he thinks about Emil’s body against him, and Emil’s hands holding his own, _and_ the way Emil was blushing madly and laughing cutely.

Yuuri has a moment to himself where he quietly screams. Then, he collects himself, and hisses in a swallow of air through tightly clenched teeth.

It’s alright, it’s alright.

 

 

 

 

The bike racks are vacant, save for Yuuri’s lone bike still tethered to a steel pole. Unfortunately for Yuuri, that isn’t the _only_ thing waiting at the bike racks for him when he arrives.

Victor Nikiforov has his arms crossed over his chest and his backpack half hanging on his shoulders. Yuuri is too late to quickly duck back inside the building to hide, and too slow to hurdle himself into the smelly dumpsters nearby. So, for a minute when their eyes lock with each other, Yuuri stands and stares like a deer about to be crushed beneath the large wheels of a semi.

“Hey,” Victor starts, casual.

“…Hey,” Yuuri responds, not nearly as casual, but trying _really_ hard to be.

Victor approaches Yuuri slowly, as though he’s afraid Yuuri will run if he walks any quicker than the shuffle he is doing now. When there is about a foot’s distance between the two of them, Yuuri clears his throat and averts his eyes. “So, um, can I help you with…anything?”

“You can maybe start by telling me what’s going on with you and this whole letter thing?” Victor asks. He doesn’t sound angry or annoyed, doesn’t sound like he’s mocking Yuuri or disgusted with Yuuri’s actions so far. His voice is still that gentle tenor from all those years ago, still having that same softness as when he asked if it was alright to lay his lips on Yuuri’s for the very first time.

“It’s…it’s really complicated,” Yuuri answers, still not looking at Victor.

“…You think maybe talking to me might _un_ -complicate it?” There’s a laugh. It makes the tips of Yuuri’s ears burn. “I’ve been told I’m a good listener, if that makes anything better?”

Yuuri wraps arms around himself again. What’s with these boys, having the audacity to get hot over the few years of high school and then be _nice_ to Yuuri after reading all the embarrassing and humiliating thoughts Yuuri confessed about them in ink. The nerve. The absolute _nerve_.

“I-I don’t know.”

“And I know a place we could talk that no one will know us?” Victor continues. He dares to step closer and Yuuri picks up a hint of refreshing mint and mountain air wafting into his wrinkling nose. “They got some _really_ good milkshakes? You like milkshakes?”

Yuuri _loves_ milkshakes. He loves getting the really tall ones with the mountain of whipped cream and a succulent cherry on top. He remembers the times his mother took him out for ice cream and they shared a milkshake, and she’d _always_ let him have the cherry with a smile.

He hasn’t had a milkshake in a year since her passing.

Yuuri bites the bottom of his lip, almost tasting the sweet syrup on his tongue.

“…A milkshake sounds nice.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you all so much for the comments and the kudos I'm OTL


	3. Chapter 3

The first thing that greets Yuuri upon walking into an unfamiliar diner is the smell of coffee and pie. He lingers at the door even after Victor has passed him to take a spot at the counter, just pausing to take in all the surroundings.

The walls are a canary yellow, the paint faded with age. The floors are of a linoleum checkerboard variety, scuffed up from the foot traffic and chairs scraping against it. Yuuri can’t tell what’s playing on the jukebox against the far right wall. Something from the sixties? The fifties? Or whatever genre that has the sound crackling and fuzzing in and out the way the song currently does to his own ears.

“Are you coming?” Victor calls out to Yuuri from the counter. He pats the stool beside him, smiling.

With a hard swallow and the tips of his ears burning, Yuuri complies and takes a seat.

“Where’d you find this place?” Yuuri questions after a waitress comes by to slip them a menu to share. She smiles at Yuuri as she pours another man’s coffee sitting two stools away from his right, lipstick stained on her teeth.

“I come up here a lot with my mom, whenever she’s in town,” Victor explains, shrugging. “She travels a lot for business and this is the only place that makes peach cobbler the way she likes.”

“And the milkshakes?”

“ _Delicious_. Best in town, in the _universe_.”

Yuuri squints his eyes at the milkshake section under the bolded ‘ **DESSERTS** ’ panel. There are no pictures and there are barely descriptions. There _is_ a lot of variety, however, from basic vanilla and chocolate to some weird names like ‘ _Cricket Crunch_ ’ and ‘ _Strawberry Nightmare_ ’.

Frowning, Yuuri murmurs, “What do you recommend?”

“What’re you in the mood for?”

 _Going home_ , Yuuri thinks, before sliding the menu towards Victor.

“Just…whatever.”

Victor studies him for a moment, but Yuuri doesn’t acknowledge the roaming eyes with a glance of his own. He keeps his eyes trained on the small kitchen window where the smell of pie and burger grease are intertwining to float into his nostrils, keeps his eyes there even after the waitress wanders back over to them and Victor gives the milkshake orders. Yuuri doesn’t dare to turn around and look Victor in the eye, not until Victor clears his throat and says, “So, while our shakes are being prepared, let’s start un-complicating this thing with you by first figuring out why you did that thing with your mouth to my face.”

Yuuri’s expression is wide-eyed and dumb. “You mean me kissing you?”

“No, no. That wasn’t a kiss. That was more of you slamming your face into my face and our lips landing in awkward places,” Victor jokes.

It wasn’t meant to be a kiss in the first place, but Yuuri still gets insulted and huffs, “Well whatever. I wasn’t trying to kiss you anyways—”

“Then what _were_ you trying to do?”

“I just—I just was trying to create a distraction—”

“From who? It was only you, me, and Chris in that hallway. Why would you need to try and distract Chris?”

Yuuri brings a hand to the side of his temple, letting out a frustrated sigh. “Look, I told you it was complicated—”

“Well that’s why we’re talking about it, right?”

“No, _you’re_ prying and I _really_ don’t want to talk about what happened in the hallway, okay? I wasn’t trying to kiss you and I _don’t_ want to talk about it,” Yuuri snaps, voice shaking.

Victor pauses. “…Okay, we won’t talk about it,” he mutters after the longest stretch of silence. He averts his eyes to his feet resting on the rung of the stool. “Can I ask about the letter?”

“What about it?

“Well, I mean…getting a love letter is just…I don’t know…” Victor rubs at the back of his neck, cheeks burning red and a laugh slipping from the bow of his mouth. “I felt happy?”

Yuuri does not have the cognizance to keep the scoff down. “Yeah, that’s what they all said,” he mutters, sticking his cheek in the palm of his hand.

“…’They’?”

A beat.

Yuuri’s eyes widen, and he slaps his hand over his face, groaning from the impact and damning the slip of his tongue.

“Wait, I’m not the only one that got a letter?” Victor questions. Then, “Did Chris also get a letter? Was—was _that_ why you were trying to get away?”

The waitress drifts by with a tray holding two tall milkshakes topped with a hill of whipped cream, hot chocolate fudge, and a cherry on top. She sets the drinks on the counter in front of them, winking to them both. “Two ‘Gargantuas’,” she coos. Victor smiles at her, but it’s still tense at the corners. Yuuri goes back to staring at the window.

“…I thought that Chris was dating Phichit,” Victor starts when the woman leaves to tend to another patron. “And isn’t Phichit—”

“Yes. _Yes_ , Phichit is my friend and I’m a total piece of shit for writing Christophe a love letter when they _were_ dating, but I didn’t _intend_ for him _or_ you _or_ Emil and JJ to even _get_ those letters and I just want this all to disappear because this was all in the past and I was stupid and I still _am_ stupid and I _just_ —”

“Woah, woah, wait, hold on, stop, stop, stop,” Victor’s hand slides to Yuuri’s knee. It does the instant job of shutting Yuuri up. “You wrote _four_ love letters?”

“…Technically I wrote five, but the fifth letter being received wasn’t an accident.”

“Who’s the fifth recipient?”

“I _really_ don’t want to talk about it—”

“Was it Worthington?” Victor asks. He says the name with a wrinkle of his nose, like it’s enough to leave a bitter taste on his tongue that he chases away with a slurp of his shake.

Frankly, the name leaves a bitter taste on Yuuri’s tongue from _hearing_ it.

“…Yes.”

Victor hums around his straw. “…So, what happened between you two then—”

“Okay, you know what? I—I told you what I wanted to tell you _and_ things I _didn’t_ want to tell you. So, as far as I’m concerned, we don’t ever have to talk about this situation again and I—” Yuuri starts gathering his things and getting to his feet. “I’m going home—”

“Wait, wait,” Victor reaches out to grab Yuuri’s hand before he can get too far out of reach. “Okay, Worthington is a touchy-subject. I won’t bring him up. Come on, this milkshake is _really_ good.”

“So you’ll enjoy finishing mine,” Yuuri says and shakes his hand free of Victor’s grip. He clutches the strap of his messenger bag tight. “Just…just please leave me alone.”

He keeps his head down as he speaks, and doesn’t lift it up as he speed walks away from the countertop and out the front door, leaving the smell of pie and chocolate and the look of Victor’s eyes behind.

 

* * *

 

The letter to Chad Worthington was written on a piece of egg-white colored stationery and sealed in a scarlet red envelope. There was no address written on it, just a simple ‘ _To Chad_ ’ that was discreetly written and designed during History, just before Yuuri slipped the letter into Chad’s locker before he left for home.

“This movie is _soooo_ bad,” Phichit had groaned during their Friday Movie Night, right before he scooped up a handful of kettle corn to feed to Christophe snuggled up beside him in the chair. Christophe hummed as he chewed, while his hand stroked the curve of Phichit’s hip in lazy movements.

“But you picked it?” he pointed out.

Phichit pouted. “Yeah but I thought it was going to be bad in the ‘so bad, it’s great’ kind of way, not ‘so bad, it’s _bad_ ’ way,” he complained. In response, Christophe tilted his head at an angle to kiss at Phichit’s pout once, twice, three quick pecks.

Yuuri wasn’t even focusing on the movie anymore.

“I’m going to get something to drink,” he said, not intending for it to come out as a grumble. Phichit and Christophe didn’t hear him over the combined noise of their laughter and the terrible music choices of the crappy movie they were watching, but it was fine; Yuuri didn’t want his bitterness to be heard anyways.

His father and mother were out on a dinner date at some fancy restaurant half way across town. Mari was gone too, out clubbing with friends and celebrating _not_ failing her midterms. The kitchen was quiet, uncomfortably quiet. Though, Yuuri couldn’t admit why it was so uncomfortable. He didn’t _want_ to acknowledge why his stomach felt like it was churning and _why_ when he poured himself a glass of ginger ale, his hands were trembling.

 _It’s fine, it’s okay. It was just a stupid crush in the past and you’ve moved on and it wouldn’t have worked out between you two anyways_ , Yuuri’s mind hissed when he took a messy gulp of his drink. _Stop feeling this_. **_Stop feeling like this_**.

He jumped when he felt a buzz in the back of his pocket, setting his glass down to reach for his phone that had a text notification from an unknown number.

>Sup

Yuuri’s brow furrowed.

>>??

>Its chad

>Did u forget u wrote ur number in that letter you left me or???

Yuuri gasped, then got scared he got heard, then questioned why the hell was he getting scared about being heard _gasping?_

>>No

>>Sorry

>>I wasn’t expecting u to respond to me

>Dude u left a love letter in my locker

>Why wouldn’t I respond to it?

>>Just

>>It was really embarrassing

>Lol

>Ur cute katsuki

Yuuri’s teeth pulled at the bottom of his lip, skin heating as he read that text three times over. Cute. _Cute._

_Chad Worthington thinks Yuuri is cute!!!_

>U really think I look good at practice?

>>Um yeah

>>Ur really good. R u thinking about playing in college when we graduate?

 _Ugh_ , _what is he doing?! That’s such a lame thing to ask!!!_

>Hmm

>Idk yet

>Tbh I’m getting kinda burned out being around football

>My old man is trying to convince me to go to his alma mater and play, but I was thinking about something else

>>Like what?

>You gotta promise not to laugh

>>🤞

>I was thinking about art school

>>Art school?

>>Wait, u draw??

>Lol

>Just a little🤣

>Its a hobby and I like it

>>Oh

>>Thats nice

>>I like writing things

>>Poetry and short stories

>>Stuff like that

>Cool cool👍

>Maybe I’ll show you my stuff if you show me yours? 😉

Yuuri’s never shown _anyone_ his stuff. He hesitated in responding, but luckily Chad responded before Yuuri could worm up an excuse _not_ to share what he poured his heart and soul and the most intimate pieces of him in.

>Hey u busy rn?

>Come over to my place

>My parents r gone for the weekend😉

Yuuri flushed scarlet.

>>No

>>I mean

>>Um

>>I have friends over for movie night and I just can’t leave rn

>Oh

>Can I come over then?

Phichit never really cared for the football players. Christophe tolerated them due to a handful of players also holding positions within the student body.

But Phichit and Christophe were wrapped up with themselves and not even watching the movie so, would they even _care_ if Chad just happened to be there too? If Chad and Yuuri shared a chair the same way that Christophe and Phichit shared one? If Chad had his arm wrapped around Yuuri with his hand on Yuuri’s hip, and Yuuri fed Chad popcorn even though _he still had another functioning hand that he could have used to feed himself popcorn—_

“Yuuri!”

This time, Yuuri’s gasp choked out into a scream that lept from his throat as he lept off the floor. Christophe and Phichit were in the doorway, Christophe’s large jacket looking two sizes two big when draped over Phichit’s narrow shoulders.

“Dude!” Phichit continued in his loud exclamation, “So the creepy dad ended up killing his entire family with a _shotgun_ and—and so it’s like a flashback from the bad guy’s point of view or whatever and—when the dad goes into the room _with the shotgun_ , he’s like—” Phichit couldn’t get the words out faster than his laughter. “You gotta come and watch the scene, it’s _so bad_.”

Yuuri held his cell phone against his fast beating heart, eyes wide with still nervous shock.

“U-Uh, okay. I’m coming…um, Chad Worthington is coming over, by the way—”

“Chad Worthington?” Christophe questioned the same time the smile fell from Phichit’s face and a disgruntled “ _What?_ ” replaced it.

Yuuri swallowed his nerves, but they did not fully leave his twisting lips. “I invited Chad Worthington over to watch movies with us,” he repeated, voice stronger.

“I don’t understand. When have you even talked to Chad Worthington outside of us being forced to work together in Ciao Ciao’s English project?” Phichit questioned.

“I don’t know why that even matters. I think he’s cute, I gave him my number and I invited him over,” Yuuri answered. The weird feeling started to churn in his stomach again. A taste of something nasty brimmed at the back of his throat.

“Uh, it _should_ matter. Besides, movie night is _our_ thing. You can’t just invite a _tool_ like Chad Worthington over to intrude on _our_ thing.”

“Since it’s _my house,_ ** _my_** _media room_ and _my movie accounts_ , I think I can make whatever rules I want.”

Christophe placed a hand on Phichit’s hip, curling his hand gently around it for Yuuri to see how he rubbed little circles into the wrinkles of Phichit’s shirt with the edge of his thumb.

“Okay, let’s just relax—”

“Yuuri, what’s going on?” Phichit questioned. His tone was that inquiring tone. That non-assuming tone that wanted to coax discussion instead of arguments. That tone that normally relaxed Yuuri to talk about whatever he was thinking, but now further strengthens the mental wall he built up around himself.

“Nothing is going on! I just want him here!”

“But _why?_ ”

“Who cares?! You two will too busy being gross with each other to notice him anyways!!”

Phichit’s eyes widened. Christophe closed his and winced.

Then, after that, Yuuri’s hands slapped themselves over his mouth.

“Oh my god,” he said into his shaking palms. “Oh god—” He turned fast on the heels of his feet and briskly walked out of the kitchen into the living room.

“Yuuri! Y-Yuuri wait!” Phichit’s voice called out after him as Yuuri took three steps at a time up to escape into his bedroom and lock the door behind him. He threw himself onto the bed, brought his face into the pillow to scream.

He’s so _stupid_.

He doesn’t want to feel like this. He _really_ doesn’t want to feel like this.

There was a knock at the door. “Yuuri? Yuuri, I’m _really_ sorry,” Phichit apologized from the hallway. Another knock. “Yuuri?…Okay, me and Chris are…we’re gonna go and get donuts or something. If—if you want to hang with us there or, um, if you want to bring Chad and hang, that’s…that’ll be okay!”

Yuuri released another muffled scream. He’s such a shitty friend. Why wasn’t Phichit making this easier by calling him out on it?!

“Just, just call me if anything happens or if you want to talk, okay? We’ll see you at school…I’m really sorry.”

There was the sound of footsteps fading away down the stairs. Fainter away, the sound of Yuuri’s front door being opened and gently closed shut made its way to Yuuri’s ears.

Then, there was a buzz from the phone that was still tightly clutched in Yuuri’s fist.

>Hello?

>U still there

>Lol

Yuuri stared at the text messages, and ran his tongue over his bottom lip to lick away the bitter taste still on his mouth

>>Yeah

>>Come over

 

 

 

 

Chad Worthington was tall and broad shouldered, messy straw blonde hair and sea blue eyes that raked over Yuuri’s body when Yuuri opened the door to let him in.

“I’ve never seen this movie before,” he told Yuuri, his voice husky against the shell of Yuuri’s ear. Yuuri, who was trying to forget how embarrassed and how uncomfortable he felt sitting on Chad’s lap, gave a ‘nonchalant’ hum.

“My friends and I watched the remake, and we were going to cleanse ourselves with the original.”

“Mmm.” Chad’s hands wandered into Yuuri’s shirt. Yuuri fought the squeal of shock down.

 _It’s alright_ , Yuuri thought as Chad’s lips found the hollow of his throat.

 _It’s okay,_ Yuuri convinced as Chad’s mouth covered his own and the movie was being ignored.

“It’s kind of uncomfortable in this chair,” Chad murmured against Yuuri’s mouth, tone soft. “You think we could move somewhere else?”

“U-Um.” Yuuri gestured with a tilt of his head to the screen. “What about the movie?”

“You’ve seen it before right?”

“Well, yeah, but…um…”

Chad laughed. “You’re cute, Katsuki,” he said with a crooked smile, and pressed that smile back against where Yuuri’s lips were still warm.

 

 

 

 

 

Chad was gone before Mari came home. And apparently, a night of drinking was not enough to keep Mari from noticing the purple bruise on Yuuri’s neck when she staggered over to him for a hug goodnight.

“Where the _fuck_ did you get this from?” she questioned, immediately sobered up to glare hard.

Yuuri bit his bottom lip and kept his eyes averted. “From my new boyfriend?”

 

* * *

 

“So you still have the same locker from last year, huh?”

Yuuri does his best to not even acknowledge that he heard the question in the first place and continues to rifle through his locker for his pencil case. _Not_ standing to his left, Chad Worthington is _not_ casually leaning against the lockers and waiting for Yuuri to _not_ respond. Or—actually— _do_ respond. “I really like that sweater you’re wearing. You always wore cute things. You still have that sweater with the bulldog delivering pizza on it?”

Yuuri does indeed have that sweater. But Chad doesn’t exist right now, so Yuuri still continues to search through his locker.

Chad leans in closer. “So you’re going to ignore me now? That’s pretty unfair, don’t you think?”

Yuuri has to bite the inside of his cheek to keep his lips from frowning. _Don’t react_ , his mind urges. _Don’t say a fucking thing._

Chad sighs deep, then clicks his tongue against his teeth as he shifts his body to peer inside Yuuri’s locker as well. He’s close enough that Yuuri can feel his body heat radiating. Chad is the only one of Yuuri’s letters that hasn’t drastically changed since it was written. He’s still big and tall, still all hard lines and handsome features that made Yuuri swoon once upon a time. He smells like the shampoo Yuuri once bought him for Christmas, and that infuriates Yuuri in more ways than one.

Without a word, Chad reaches into Yuuri’s locker behind his Japanese and Physics notebooks, withdrawing the soft pencil case Yuuri had been looking for faster than Yuuri has the chance to snatch it away and bolt.

Chad then holds the pencil case out of Yuuri’s reach, his eyebrow raised skeptically. “So, you gonna talk to me, or you gonna try and get the pencil case ‘magically floating in the air by an unseen and unheard force’?”

“I just want to go to class, Chad.”

“And I just want to talk to you,” Chad responds in turn. His eyes soften, and Yuuri has to turn his head to look at the bulletin board across them in the hallway. “I haven’t talked to you since last year.”

“Well, yeah. We broke up. Why would I want to talk to you?”

“You haven’t heard of ‘being cordial to your ex’?”

“Give me my case back—”

“No. No, not until you answer a question. Then I’ll give it back.”

Yuuri’s sigh is exhausted. It isn’t even halfway through the day.

“What do you want?” he grumble-asks.

“Do you have a date for Homecoming?”

“I’m not going to Homecoming.”

“What about the Homecoming game?”

“You only said _a_ question, not _some_ questions,” Yuuri says curtly and makes a grab for his pencil case. Chad side-steps and holds it above his head.

“Come to the Homecoming game. I’ll give it to you if you agree to it.”

“Why would—we _broke up_. I just want to be _left alone_.” Yuuri holds his hand out expectantly. “ _And_ I want my pencil case back.”

“It’s only a two letter response, Katsuki. It’s not rocket science,” Chad says with a crooked smile and _ugh_ , the blood beneath Yuuri’s skin is _boiling_ by how that smile is making his throat feel itchy like all those months ago.

“N-O.”

“Wrong answer. Try again.”

Yuuri slams his locker shut with a growl in his throat and a huff from his twisted lips. “I don’t have time for this,” he mutters more to himself than to Chad’s smirk. Yuko can loan him a pencil. She always has five extra spares for Takeshi to use, so Yuuri can have at _least_ one.

He turns swiftly on the balls of his feet and begins to stomp off to his third period, only for a hand to grab at his wrist and halt him from angrily stomping off too far.

“Wait, wait.” Chad’s voice is pleading. “Wait, hold on. I was just joking. I just want to find some time for us to talk—”

“ _Please_ just leave me alone—”

“No, this is _serious_. I _really_ need to talk to you—”

“Get your hands off my boyfriend.”

Yuuri’s head whirs around to look the same time Chad’s hand slips from his wrist and gets replaced by Victor’s soft grip. There is no time to react in confusion or annoyance or _any sort of relief_ , since the moment Victor takes hold of Yuuri, he pulls Yuuri to his side and throws a warm arm around Yuuri’s shoulders. “Pretend we’re talking about something cute,” Victor whispers to Yuuri, just before he puts his mouth in Yuuri’s hair and gives three ‘ha-ha-ha’s.

Though, Yuuri is no better. His ‘pretending that they’re talking about something cute’ is just him gaping like a confused fish as Victor steers them through the hallway.

They hook a right and go past the student body offices. Christophe is at the doorway when his eyes lock with Yuuri’s wide and nervous ones.

Yuuri panics.

And his panic translates to jerking up suddenly to kiss Victor at the junction where his chin meets his neck. If he moved any faster, he might have head-butted Victor in the jaw.

Victor looks surprised, but thankfully not confused and weirded out. And in the literal two seconds that it took to pass Christophe without saying ‘hi’ or acknowledging him, out of the corner of Yuuri’s eye, the blond looks only confused.

So…the plan was a success???

“Let’s go to the quad for a bit,” Victor suggests against the side of Yuuri’s temple. Yuuri—too anxious, mentally overloaded and just flat out emotionally _exhausted—_ agrees with only a single nod.

 

 

 

 

The quad is empty. Of course it’s empty. Yuuri should have been asking Yuko for a pencil right now while listening to Miss Haruno try and work her latest grievance about her frustratingly hot neighbor into the weekly lesson.

“If anyone asks, we can just say we’re doing a photoshoot for Yearbook,” Victor explains to the furrowed pull of Yuuri’s eyebrows as they sit at a table beneath the bare trees. He withdraws from his backpack a camera case and takes the DSLR out to place around his neck. “So,” Victor begins, fiddling with the dials for no reason, “he does that a lot? Just fucking around with you?”

“…Only if he knew someone else was watching.”

“Sounds pretty shitty,” Victor comments with a chuckle. “Can’t believe you dated him for a year—”

“Look, I _don’t_ want to hear any comments or critiques about me and Chad dating. I _know_ already…and how do you know we even dated for a year anyways?”

Victor shrugs. “I mean, football players like to make it known to everybody who they’re doing—”

“We _didn’t_ do anything,” Yuuri spits, rising from his spot at the table. “I should just go—”

“Wait—” Victor reaches out to Yuuri, but pauses before his fingers have the chance to wrap around Yuuri’s wrist. Yuuri hesitates as well, watching Victor’s hand retreat back to fiddling around with the camera around Victor’s neck. “I’m sorry. I’m _really_ sorry I keep sticking my foot in my mouth whenever I’m around you. I—I don’t care about any of that stuff, okay? So, if you say you didn’t do anything, you didn’t do anything. If you don’t want to talk about it, we won’t talk about it.”

He looks Yuuri straight in the eye before he adds, “If you want, whenever I say something that pisses you off, just punch me in the face.”

A giggle snort slips out past Yuuri’s lips before it gets smothered against the palm of his hand. “W—Why would I _punch_ you?” he asks with his hand barely obscuring his mouth.

“Well, my little brother kicks me whenever I say something that pisses him off, and you two have similar sounding names. So, my hypothesis is that if all Yuris are able to release their anger by channeling it into beating the shit out of the thing that makes them angry, you punching me _might_ be a good thing,” Victor offers.

Yuuri stares down at the boy still seated at the table. Then, with his hand not covering his mouth, he lightly smacks Victor’s cheek.

Victor, of course, yelps. Yuuri, of course, panics.

“Oh my god! Did that hurt?! It wasn’t meant to hurt!” Yuuri hurries to say, touching at Victor reddened face.

“I didn’t think you were actually going to _hit me!_ I wasn’t expecting it!”

“But you _told me to!_ ”

“But I _wasn’t expecting it!!_ ”

“Oh my _god_.” Yuuri shakes his head, his lips curving into a smile. “Well, your hypothesis was totally wrong because now I feel awful for hitting you.”

Victor leans his cheek into Yuuri’s touch. “Mmm, I don’t know. You’re smiling—at the expense of my pain—”

“I am not!” Yuuri laughs with his _not_ -smile. Victor laughs back, breath warm against the inner part of Yuuri’s wrist.

For a split second, Yuuri doesn’t think to pull his hand away from Victor’s face. He doesn’t realize how he’s tracing the curve of Victor’s cheekbone with his thumb, while his pinky can reach far enough to curl a lock of silvery hair. It is only when Victor hums again—that gentle and soft hum that Yuuri can feel vibrate against his hand—and says, “What if we fake date?” that Yuuri snatches his hand back to rest at his side.

“W- _What?_ ”

“I mean—okay, look—Worthington won’t bother you anymore if he thinks that you’re seeing someone, right? If we just…you know…hold hands and walk together…maybe sit together at lunch and just be seen together, he’ll back off, and you spend the rest of your senior year comfortably knowing he won’t be messing with you,” Victor further explains.

“W-Well, yeah, but that doesn’t explain why _you_ think us fake dating is s good idea. Like, how does it benefit _you_?”

Victor rubs at his nose. He coughs, averting his eyes. “I—uh—well—I just…got out of a relationship.”

“With who?”

“Oh it was some guy. Some guy that goes to a neighboring school that I met at a lacrosse game. His name isn’t that important.”

The wrinkle of Yuuri’s brows return. “Oh…uh…so…was it bad?”

“Well it wasn’t _good_. He didn’t appreciate what we had going and I want to make him regret treating me the way that he did.”

“Oh…I see…” Yuuri runs his hands over his knees. “So, you want to make him jealous by me dating you?”

“If you’re comfortable with that. I mean, you get Chad away from you and I get something beneficial out of this as well, so we’re perfectly even.”

Yuuri bites the inside of his cheek. “I don’t know…”

“Hey, listen.” Victor leans in, hand going to Yuuri’s knee again. It still has the same paralyzing effect. “You don’t have to do this. It’s only if you want to. If you don’t, we don’t ever have to talk about this again and you can slap me in the face. But gentler this time.”

“No. No more physical abuse from you saying dumb things,” Yuuri insists with a pout. Victor chuckles and squeezes Yuuri’s knee, and Yuuri brings a hand to his chest because ??? His heart is beating _really_ fast right now and that’s????

“U-Um, okay so, can I just…think about this?” Yuuri asks. _And also leave because I’m getting hot and sweaty and I don’t know_ ** _why_** _._

“Sure, yeah. You can text me?”

“Yeah. Yeah, we can - we can text.” Yuuri reaches into his backpack to get a marker from his pencil case and _oh fuck_.

Victor laughs again, keeping his hand on Yuuri’s knee while he goes through a side pouch on his backpack for a Sharpie pen. He hands it to Yuuri, who takes it with an appreciative nod and a hot blush spreading over his face.

Yuuri writes his number on the inside of Victor’s hand, hoping that his hand isn’t too sweaty and shaking too much for the writing to be illegible. He doesn’t dare to look up into Victor’s face as he writes, not even a glance when he’s _done_ writing. Everything stings—his cheeks, his lips, his hands and his throat.

“Just—um—just message me your number and, you know…things.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Victor is talking with the dumbest of smiles. Yuuri doesn’t even _need_ to be looking at Victor to know the boy is smiling from ear to ear; he hears it in the soft lilt of Victor’s voice, how it sounds airy and filled of unnecessary wonder. “Oh, wait, before you go—” Victor reaches into his backpack and withdraws a small pink card that he quickly signs off of before handing to Yuuri. “In case you need an excuse for your tardiness, you were being interviewed and photographed.”

“…Shouldn’t you have at least a photo of me then?” Yuuri asks, taking the card to look at Victor’s signature. “So we can better corroborate our story?”

Victor’s smile is crooked on his lips. “Well, we _probably_ can spare a few more minutes for a few quick shots, if you want?”

Yuuri turns the card in between his fingers, cheeks warm. “Yeah,” he murmurs. “Sounds like a plan.”

 

* * *

 

In sixth period, Yuuri creates a pros and cons list of fake dating Victor Nikiforov.

It is significantly harder to do than he expected.

There’s not a lot of pros Yuuri was able to think of through the lecture. Hell, he only thought of the one that Victor gave: Chad leaving Yuuri alone. But even _that_ is a toss-up between a pro and a con; sure Chad may leave Yuuri alone initially, but that may only spurn the boy into pursuing after Yuuri even _harder_. Football players and lacrosse members—for whatever reason Yuuri has yet to find—are appalled with each other. And Chad will not hesitate to rescue Yuuri from the grimy hands of ‘second rate, stick flailing posers’. Or whatever creative name the football players can think of in their locker room huddle.

There are a lot of cons though, a _lot_ of cons. It will be humiliating if they got caught fake dating, Yuuri barely knows much about Victor aside from how blue his eyes are and how soft his lips were in freshman year, Yuuri _really_ doesn’t think he’s ready to put himself through emotionally investing in a relationship again—fake or not, and just…him…dating… _Victor_.

Victor is handsome and tall and smells like vanilla mixed with peppermint. Yuuri is considerably less handsome, a head shorter than Victor, and smells like sweaty donuts.

 _No one_ is going to believe _they’re_ dating.

“I think I’m going to go for a floral suit. I want to just ‘ _pop_ ’, you know? I make a great impression with Seung-Gil on my arm, we mingle a bit with our classmates, just enough for people to think six months later, ‘Hey, remember Phichit with that _great_ floral print suit and his date? They should be nominated for prom court!’”

“Hmm?” Yuuri looks up from his listing to Phichit sitting at his side, neither of them reading through the article on ‘the art of filibustering’.

Phichit frowns, elbowing Yuuri gently. “I’m talking about _homecoming_ , remember? The stepping stone in my grand plan to be nominated for prom king and win?”

“I didn’t know about this ‘stepping stone’ plan of yours,” Yuuri admits, closing his notebook before Phichit can glance at what he’s writing. “Um, but you can explain it again?”

Phichit does explain it again.

He explains the technicalities of it, the finer details of how he will handle homecoming and the winter formal and the senior ski trip that are coming up, before they return for school and prom will be the only thing the graduating class will care about.

“I’ll have to compete against Chris now though, instead of us both getting prom king,” Phichit then murmurs with a sigh, resting his chin in the palm of his hand. “…It’s…kind of weird…”

Yuuri stills himself, tapping the tip of his (borrowed) pencil against his paper.

“Weird like…like you don’t want to compete against friends?”

“Weird like I was planning on us being the couple that wins the prom crown since we we started dating in freshman year and now we’re…you know.”

“Oh.” Yuuri bites the inside of his cheek, averting his eyes. “…Do you…miss him?”

Phichit laughs. “We see each other _every_ day and talk to each other all the time. How can I miss him?”

“You know that’s not what I mean.”

Yuuri isn’t sure if his tone came off too harshly, or if the face he’s making is a mean one rather than a neutral one, but Phichit’s smile immediately disappears from his lips the moment Yuuri opens his mouth, and Yuuri immediately regrets doing so in the first place.

“…I mean…” Phichit starts playing with a lock of his hair. “Yeah, there’s things I miss from when we were together…but, you know, it’s fine. We agreed that it’s better for us to just be friends and I’m fine with that.”

He turns to his article and starts to highlight some text, not minding the confliction spreading over Yuuri’s face. “By the way,” Phichit says as a change of topic, “Chris texted me that he saw you and Victor disappear off somewhere…and you kissed Victor apparently?”

Yuuri turns into a sputtering mess in under a second.

“I—that’s—it was—that—n-no, I was—u-uh—” Yuuri bites at the bottom of his lip, swallowing hard. “I—we’re…I didn’t kiss him. I missed his mouth, so I didn’t kiss him.”

“…But you _were_ together and disappeared off somewhere?”

“I mean, he just needed to take some pictures of me for Yearbook. No big deal,” Yuuri scoffs, drumming his fingertips against the surface of the table. “…Did Christophe say anything else to you?”

“No? What else would he say?”

“Nothing. Nothing. Just that.” Yuuri forces his eyes back to his notebook. He feels Phichit is watching him without saying anything, but eventually, Phichit’s eyes wander back to his own page, and Yuuri remembers how to breathe.

He still needs to put step three of his (pretty much forgotten now) plan into action. He can’t keep Christophe dangling forever on this. The itty-bitty-teeny-tiny part of him doesn’t _want_ to keep Christophe dangling forever on this.

Yuuri sits there, thinking on it, thinking about what to say and where is he going to say it and _what_ is he going to do after he says what he needs to say only for Christophe to say something Yuuri doesn’t want to hear. He thinks, and he thinks, and he doesn’t even read the article in front of him, eyes wandering over the paragraphs without taking a bit of information in. Christophe, Christophe, Christophe. _What can we do about you?_

And then, something clicks.

Something that rests deep in the furrows of Yuuri’s mind where the itty-bitty-teeny-tiny part of him can’t reach _clicks_.

He swiftly unlocks his cell phone resting on his lap and opens up Victor’s newly established contact.

>Meet me by the bleachers after school

Victor doesn’t hesitate in his response.

>>Whatever you say

 

 

 

 

Just as before, Yuuri tells Phichit to not walk him to the bikes due to staying at school later. And just as before, Phichit regards him with a look of mild suspicion, before he nods his head with a shrug of his shoulders.

“Text me when you get home so we can go over how to _not_ fail for this exam!” Phichit calls out to Yuuri as he is swallowed by the mass of students heading out to the parking lot. Yuuri waves his friend goodbye, before turning on his heel and heading out towards the outside quad and in the direction of the lacrosse field.

The air is cold, but Yuuri’s face is hot. He’s breathing hard as though he ran a marathon prior, when he’s only been keeping this brisk walking pace for three minutes. Is that normal? Is Yuuri being _weird?_ There’s no _need_ to be weird! Yuuri is taking control of things and he has all the power (or at least, Victor _made it seem_ like Yuuri has all the power), so he shouldn’t be nervous!!!

He may not have a lot of pros for going along with Victor’s plan, but the one pro—the one moment that made everything just _click!_ —was all the reasoning Yuuri needs.

Victor is already at the bleachers, backpack resting on one of the benches while he bundles himself up in his sweat jacket.

“Yo! Katsuki!” Victor calls out as Yuuri rounds the corner and enters the field through the metal fence. His face is bright red, though Yuuri can’t tell if it’s a blush or because it’s so cold all the blood is rushing to stain Victor’s cheeks. Either way, it’s endearingly cute and Yuuri just _can’t_.

“U-Um, hey.” Yuuri awkwardly sits down on the bleacher by Victor’s backpack. Victor moves down to sit beside him, rubbing his bare hands together for some warmth.

“So, what’s your verdict?” Victor questions.

Yuuri hisses in a sharp breath of cold air. He can do this. He can do this.

This is just killing two birds with one stone.

“We fake date,” Yuuri says strongly. Victor nods. “But, we have guidelines.”

A pause. “…Like…like a contract or something?” Victor asks, confused.

Yuuri blinks. “Um, I wasn’t _thinking_ about a contract, but now that you bring it up a contract is probably a good idea—” He reaches into his backpack for one of his notebooks and his pencil ca— _dammit_ , he did it again!

“You _never_ got it back?” Victor asks incredulously, already handing Yuuri a pen from the side pouch of his backpack

“He’ll—I don’t know, it’s not a big deal. I have a bunch of them back home that I can use,” Yuuri grumbles with a frustrated huff and flips to a clean page. “Okay, so. Our fake dating contract. We will have a list of rules that both parties must abide by. Any violation of these rules will result in immediate termination of our fake dating arrangements.”

Victor raises his hand. “Question: are you going to be making the rules?”

“…Um…” Yuuri turns the pen in between his fingers. “Well…I mean…if you want to have rules of your own…and I don’t veto them and vice versa, then we can make a balanced rule list?”

Victor nods. “Okay, fair. So then, what do you propose our first rule to be?”

“For starters, no kissing.”

“Vetoed.”

Yuuri scoffs. “No. No, this is non-negotiable—”

“No one’s going to believe we’re dating if I’m not allowed to kiss you,” Victor explains, then, “Plus, I got my braces off in sophomore year so, you don’t have to worry about getting cut or anything—”

“No, no. That’s not why I—” Yuuri closes his eyes and gathers his thoughts. He breathes the cold air in deeply, lets it sit in his lungs until the tremors in his body dissipate with his sigh. “Look, when me and Chad were together…he was always grabbing me, kissing me, making a—a show of our relationship for his football buddies and whoever he thought was watching. I—I didn’t like it when it was real and I _know_ I won’t like it when it’s fake. So…”

Victor bites the inside of his cheek. “…I didn’t know that…okay…what about a compromise? You kiss me when you want to kiss me, and I keep my hands to myself.”

Yuuri swallows hard and he nods. “Okay…right then…’no kissing (unless it’s Yuuri-approved)’.”

He bullets the point at the very top of the page. Underlines it too.

“You have cute handwriting,” Victor appraises with a gentle hum.

Yuuri’s cheeks catch fire. _Stop saying cute things when we’re_ ** _literally_** _planning on how to be a fake couple!!!!_ Yuuri’s cheeks would scream if they weren’t cheeks but were instead, his mouth. His mouth instead says, “You can, um, do other things? I—I know we need to make it look convincing so, just some things that I’m comfortable with?”

“What are you comfortable with?”

“Hugs are fine.” Yuuri writes that down. “I like being walked to class…we can eat lunch together…holding hands…cheek kisses are okay…nose boops…”

“…What are ‘nose boops’?” Victor asks. Yuuri clears his throat and mildly chokes on his spit all in the same go.

“U-Um, it’s…it’s the—you know—when you rub your noses together? I—I just always wanted to do it when I was dating Chad, but he went in for a kiss every time I tried to initiate it and I—” Yuuri gives a dry chuckle, shaking his head. “I-It’s stupid. I’ll cross it out—”

“No, no! Leave it! We can nose boop!” Victor urges. Yuuri laughs.

“Okay. Nose boops stay. Um…if I think of anything else, I’ll make addendums to the list, but as of now I’m fine with these things.”

Victor nods. He is also sitting a lot closer to Yuuri than he remembers, but strangely Yuuri’s heart doesn’t feel like it’s about to burst from his chest and do fifty laps around the field.

“Okay, so it’s my turn to make a rule, right?” Victor asks.

“If you want.”

“You have to come to my lacrosse games,” Victor says, taking the pen and notebook from Yuuri to write in the rule. When next to Yuuri’s handwriting, Victor’s words are chicken scratch. But the little doodles of lacrosse players bookending the rule are cute, so Yuuri doesn’t point it out.

“Okay. But you have to come to my movie nights on Fridays.” Yuuri takes the notebook and pen back and writes the rule underneath. After a beat, he doodles in a reel of movie film and a popcorn bucket.

“I get to pick you up to and from school,” Victor declares, reaching for the pen and notebook again. Yuuri turns away, holding the items out of reach

“O-Oh, you don’t have to do that—”

“But what if I want to? How early do you wake up so you can pedal that granny bike of yours to school?”

“It’s not a granny bike!” The defensive edge shouldn’t be as sharp on Yuuri’s tongue, but well, there it is.

“It has a woven basket and a silver bell. Plus if you didn’t have to take it with you to school, it leaves us up to do things together after school. Speaking of which—” Victor uses his long arms to reach around Yuuri and trap him from squirming out of his hold. Not that Yuuri _tries_ to squirm out of Victor’s hold; he is pretty positive that Victor Nikiforov having this paralyzing effect on his body is not good for his health. “You _are_ going to try a milkshake from Aria’s.”

Victor writes in the rules with their corresponding doodles, all the while having his arms around Yuuri. He even gets comfortable enough to tuck his chin on Yuuri’s shoulder, but Yuuri is too confused to say anything other than a caveman grunt.

“Okay, anything else?” Victor asks.

“…We should keep this a secret. It would—it would be really bad if anyone found out we were fake dating.”

“Logical.” Victor pens in the ‘no snitching’ rule.

“…I can…make posters for your game…I guess.”

Yuuri can feel Victor smile against the collar of his jacket as he writes ‘Yuuri makes cheer posters’, and doodles a crude stick figure with glasses holding a square with crooked hearts. Trying not to focus too hard on the shape of Victor’s mouth, Yuuri clears his throat again and begins to play with the bottom of his coat. “Okay, so I think that’s about—”

“Wait. One more thing.” Victor makes a bullet point eight, and in heavy scrawl, he writes:

**YUURI WILL COME WITH VICTOR ON THE SENIOR SKI TRIP**

Yuuri immediately tenses upon reading it.

Victor lifts his chin from his shoulder. “What’s wrong?” he asks.

“…That’s…um, that’s just…it’s three months away, you know? Do you think we’re still going to be doing this for that long?” Yuuri asks with a feigned smile. It’s a partial truth, not the _entire_ reason he’s freaking out. Actually, it’s maybe only five percent of the reason why Yuuri’s freaking out.

He’s heard stories about the senior ski trip. It’s a weekend getaway in the mountains for a handful of seniors to spend cozied away at a luxurious mountain lodge drinking hot chocolate, snowboarding, skiing and sledding. There’s a spa and sauna and a jacuzzi. The dining is all paid and _delicious_ , the robes are complimentary, and the beds are so luxuriously soft that they feel as though you’re sleeping on a cumulus puff.

It’s also the place where on average more seniors lose their virginity in comparison to prom and grad night _combined_.

Chad was ecstatic about going to the senior ski trip with Yuuri last year.

“We can just put it as a ‘maybe’. If we break up before it happens, then we won’t go together. Pretty simple, right?” Victor says with a shrug. Yuuri bites the inside of his cheek, not speaking as Victor proceeds to doodle in snowflakes and a stickman skiing down a mountain.

Yuuri doesn’t need them to be dating for three months. In fact, he’s _positive_ they’ll only do this for one.

One month should be long enough for Christophe to realize that Yuuri _one-hundred-percent_ does not have the same feelings he wrote in that letter from all those years ago, and therefore, will never _ever_ bring up the letter situation.

This is a good plan.

This is a _great_ plan.

“Okay, fine. It’s a deal,” Yuuri says with a determined huff, taking the pen to draw two lines underneath the listing of rules. He signs his name first, then passes the pen off to Victor who signs as well.

The gulp of cold air goes roughly down Yuuri’s throat when he swallows it, but since he hasn’t yet bursted into flames from sheer embarrassment, he presumes he’s doing just fine. Taking the notebook to slip in his backpack for now, Yuuri turns out of Victor’s grasp and offers his hand forward. “I…look forward to working with you?” he says like it’s a question Victor can reject.

Victor laughs, taking Yuuri’s hand. “You’re real cute, Katsuki. You know that?” he says in a murmur, before spontaneously leaning in close to nuzzle the tip of his nose with Yuuri’s own, Yuuri’s glasses getting slightly pushed askew.

Yuuri still hasn’t spontaneously bursted into flames from embarrassment. But his body is giving him a little preview of what that _might_ feel like. It hurts. It stings. It _burns_.

“W-Well I should—I—there’s homework and—I—um—” Yuuri stumbles to his feet, _trips_ over his feet, then just outright forgets what feet even _are_ as he haphazardly makes his way down the bleachers and to the solid ground. He continues like his legs are made of nothing but dental floss and putty to the metal fence, and behind him, he hears Victor call out, “I’ll text you later, okay?!”

Yuuri’s arm flails up in the air as a wave goodbye in response.

“Bye, boyfriend!” Victor shouts after, and Yuuri can’t tell if Victor is being a little shit, or Victor is just getting into character, _or_ if Victor is as genuinely happy about calling Yuuri ‘boyfriend’ as he sounds to Yuuri’s reddened ears.

Yuuri doesn’t acknowledge it. His brain is too frazzled to acknowledge _anything_ around him other than three loud thoughts that play on repeat in his brain.

_I’ve got a boyfriend._

_I’ve got a_ **_fake_ ** _boyfriend._

_I’m_ **_so_ ** _fucked._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm sorry I've been so inconsistent with updating jdjfldjf school is really throwing me off balance OTL but thank you all so much for your comments i really really am so grateful to read each one 😭


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